Original Work Mercenary's March (The Schooled in Magic Universe)

Hi, everyone

Mercenary’s March is the second story in the tales of The Schooled In Magic Universe series, following The Princess Exile. Like the first story, it is entirely stand-alone, providing an opportunity for me to experiment with different genres - in this case, military fantasy - and explore the impact of Emily’s innovations on different characters that might not ever meet Emily herself. All you really need to know, if you haven’t been reading the earlier books, is that the necromancers who ruled the southern continent (otherwise known as the Blighted Lands) have been defeated through the introduction of magitech that turns their magical strength into a lethal weakness, allowing weaker but saner magicians and their mundane allies the chance to retake the lands the necromancers stole from them. The story follows one such adventure. The rest of the background is provided in the two prologues.

If this interests you in the wider Schooled in Magic book series, you can download the first few volumes through Kindle Unlimited - Amazon.com

As always, I appreciate critiques, spelling corrections, continuity errors, and suchlike. All feedback is welcome. I’m also looking for more beta readers, so if you’re interested in that please drop me a message.

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The Chrishanger

Thank you

Chris

PS - if you’re interested in writing short stories yourself, there is a new call for submissions to Fantastic Schools. Closing date is mid-November. Please check out the link below:

Fantastic Schools - Call For Submissions

 

Prologue I (Fifteen Years Before the End of the Necromantic Wars)

The city was burning.

King Hadrian the Elder, King of Kentigern, stood on the deck of the Royal Hadrian and watched, helplessly, as his kingdom fell to darkness. The orcs were breaking through the walls, crashing though weak spots opened by weeks of bombardment, and tearing their way through the remaining defenders, already disorientated by the rapidly-spreading flames. His lines were already weakening, more and more soldiers and militiamen joining the general exodus to the docks as discipline snapped and it became clear it was every man for himself. Thousands of civilians were already there, townspeople and refugees from the surrounding countryside trying to get out before it was too late. Some were trying to get onto the last ships, their cries and pleas blending together into a awful howl that was audible even at some distance; others were plunging into the water, as if they could swim to the packed ships offshore or somehow make it across the Inner Sea to Tidebank. There was little hope of survival, not for them. The currents between the two kingdoms were dangerous beyond belief, even to ships. It was unlikely they’d last a day in the water, let alone the several days it would take to reach safety.

His heart clenched as something exploded in the distance, an eerie red-green fireball rising into the darkening sky. The kingdom had fought raiders and would-be conquerors in the past two centuries, ever since the Empire had crumbled and his ancestors had secured their independence, and survived them all … but this was different. They were facing a necromancer, a maddened sorcerer bent on slaughter and sacrifice rather than an invader who wanted the land and wealth of the kingdom for himself. There was no hope of reasoning with such an enemy, no way to convince him to accept anything the kingdom could offer him … even surrender. The defences had broken and now … all he could do was get as many of his people out before it was too late, before the coastline was seized and the kingdom became a nightmare contaminated by dark and twisted magic. The end could not be long delayed.

No, he told himself. This is the end.

He clenched his fists in silent frustration. How had it gone so wrong? The mountains should have prevented Kentigern from enemy attack, the fortress city of Strickland blocking the sole major pass through the southern mountains that served as the only plausible line of invasion. His father and grandfather had poured resources into the city, building up vast lines of defence and crafting wards and other protections that should have stood even against a necromancer. The kingdom should have been secure and yet … Strickland had fallen. Incompetence? Treachery? Or simple bad luck? King Hadrian didn’t know and in the end it didn’t matter. The moment the fortress city had fallen, opening the gates to the northern lands, it had become clear he would be the last king of his country. His son might survive, in exile, but it would be a long time before he even saw his own again.

Magic flared, flashes of light darting through the air. King Hadrian put his charmed spyglass to his eye and watched, cursing under his breath, as the last of the royal sorcerers made their final stand. They were strong men, learned in both the magical and martial arts, and yet they couldn’t hope to stand against a necromancer. He could see them roaring and chanting as they struggled to keep their wards in place for a few moments longer, but it was clear they were losing and losing badly. The king didn’t want to force himself to watch, yet … he owed it to himself to witness their end. They were giving their lives in his service …

There was another explosion, brighter this time. The flames spread rapidly, fuelled by alchemical stockpiles as they jumped from house to house. The last traces of discipline broke, infantrymen dropping their weapons and archers tossing their crossbows aside … the king gritted his teeth as he saw a handful of noblemen, aristocrats who had pledged to give their lives to buy the townspeople more time to evacuate, throwing aside their own weapons and joining the crowd in a desperate bid to escape. A couple tried to hold the line, only to be swept aside by their own men. King Hadrian noted their names, although rewarding their families as they deserved was no longer within his power. He would soon be a king-in-exile, the leader of a dispossessed people who might soon dissolve into the surrounding community. His power would only go as far as his hosts allowed, and if he pushed too far he would be told to leave the kingdom or face arrest and expulsion. It was shameful to be so weak and yet … it was a reality he could not deny. His kingdom was gone.

The panic grew worse as the flames neared the docks, shipmasters cutting their chains and trying to get their vessels out of the harbour before it was too late. The king wanted to rage at them for cowardice, even though he could hardly blame them for fleeing. It was no consolation to the rest of the desperate townspeople, trying to get onto the boats … he swallowed, hard, as he saw a young family plunging into the water. They were strangers and yet … he tried to tell himself that they were lucky to die now, rather than be enslaved and eventually sacrificed by the necromancer, their bodies fed to the orcs. It didn’t work. They hadn’t deserved to die. The kingdom hadn’t deserved its fate …

“Father!”

King Hadrian turned, just in time to see his young son running towards him. The king’s heart clenched again. Hadrian the Younger was ten years old, old enough to start learning the sword and the basics of statecraft, yet … he was going to grow up in a world that had denied him his birthright, denied him even the hope of returning to his kingdom to regain his throne. A normal usurper could be challenged and defeated, the rightful king leading an army to rid his kingdom of the false king, but necromancers were simply too powerful to defeat in a straight fight. There were few who could stand against them for long and none would do it for a king and a prince in exile. The kingdom was gone and his son … his son would never come into his own.

“I told you to stay below decks,” King Hadrian said, sharply. His son was as headstrong as his poor dead mother, who had died giving birth to his youngest daughter. “This isn’t for you.”

His son looked mulish. King Hadrian sighed and held the boy as he turned to look back at the dying city. The orcs were charging the docks now, sweeping aside the paltry resistance and grabbing townspeople for the slaughter pots. A handful of archers were firing from the fleeing boats, burning up the last of their arrows in a desperate bid to make the enemy pay, but there were always more orcs to replace the ones who fell. They kept coming, sealing off the last hope of escape. He shuddered to think how many of his people were caught behind the lines, trapped and helpless. Their lives were about to become a living nightmare.

Something prickled on the air, a sense of doom that chilled him to the bone. He looked up, his eyes drawn helplessly to the docks. A lone figure walked – no, floated – into view, a hooded man shrouded in a darkness that was far from natural. It was hard to make out anything under the shadow, save for a pair of bright red eyes. The necromancer stood there … for a moment, their eyes met. He was sure, at a very primal level, that the necromancer knew he was there … knew and didn’t care. It was hard to look away. It took him every piece of willpower he could muster to force himself to lower the spyglass.

He shivered. Even at a distance, the necromancer’s presence was very visible. His tainted magic poisoned the air.

His son cursed, using words he’d probably learnt from the soldiers. “Father, I …”

The necromancer raised a hand. A fireball swept from his fingers and struck the nearest ship, blasting the vessel into pieces of burning debris. The rest of the ships started to turn and flee, painfully slow compared to the necromancer’s magic. Five more vessels were destroyed in quick succession before the necromancer tired of his game, tired of proving the kingdom was now his and his alone. King Hadrian felt old and weak as the royal flagship spread her sails, picking up a wind that would hopefully take them out of range before it was too late. The crown felt heavier than heavy before, a mocking reminder of the burden of kingship … and his failure to keep his people safe. They had crammed thousands upon thousands of people into the ships, along with money and treasures and everything he needed to buy land and property, but it wouldn’t be enough. How could it be? He had failed and now his people were either refugees or dead.

“I’m sorry.” He wasn’t sure who he was speaking to, his people or his son. “I failed you.”

He looked down at his son, feeling a wave of fatherly affection mingled with bitter grief. His son and namesake was a fine youngster, a child who would grow into a great warrior and greater king, but now … none of their dreams would ever be realised. He’d planned to ensure his child shared the throne, learning the lessons he’d need for the day he was hailed as sole monarch … now, there was no point. The young man would grow up in exile, just another royal who had been driven from his kingdom before he ever had a chance to come into his own. And there was nothing anyone could do about it.

“Father,” his son said. “I shall return.”

King Hadrian winced. The oath – and it was an oath, however understated – was impossible to keep. Prince Hadrian had grown up on tales of mighty warriors and brave sorcerers fighting impossible odds and somehow coming out ahead. He had yet to learn that no one, no matter how brave and strong, could stand against an army, let alone a necromancer. A body of knights who charged into the Blighted Lands would be effortlessly slaughtered, an amphibious landing wouldn’t have time to unload the boats before they were wiped out. If his son went back to his kingdom, he would never return. And as he grew older, it would be harder and harder to keep his son from trying his luck.

“I will,” his son said, with all the earnestness of youth. “I won’t leave the kingdom to that … thing.”

King Hadrian looked up. The coastline was falling into darkness now, only slightly alleviated by the burning city. Kentigern had never had many coastal settlements – the tides made it harder for fishing villages to establish themselves – and the few that had made it had hopefully been evacuated now. The necromancer was well out of sight, but his presence still poisoned the world around him. There was no going back now. His duty was to his remaining people, the ones who had escaped. Guilt gnawed at his soul, a bitter reminder of his failure as a monarch. He couldn’t do anything to help the ones he’d left behind.

He rested his hand on his son’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, child,” he said, quietly. “But unless something changes we won’t see home again.”

 

Prologue II (One Year After the End of the Necromantic Wars)

There were times, in all honesty, when King Louis of Tidebank wanted to dig up his father’s grave and demand to know just what he’d been thinking when he’d allowed the refugees from Kentigern to settle in his kingdom.

He ground his teeth in frustration as he sat on his throne and waited, suspecting he already knew the answer. King Philip had been facing challenges from overmighty lords, who’d never dream of letting something like a necromancer on the other side of the Inner Sea keep them from trying to weaken their monarch, and the refugees had been immensely helpful in keeping the lords in their place. The Kentigerns had been mercenaries, to all intents and purposes, and they’d been strong enough to overwhelm the household troops the lords had managed to raise before the hammer came down. They’d been richly rewarded in return, their people granted settlement rights and their monarch-in-exile hailed as a king even though his kingdom was gone, and yet … Louis couldn’t help thinking his father had gone too far. It would have been wiser, surely, to force them to integrate into the kingdom, to spread them out rather than allowing them to form a community of their own. But instead …

It wasn’t as if they were bad – or disloyal. Their settlement was more law-abiding than most city-states. Their young men were soldiers and mercenaries, their women merchants and traders as well as craftswomen and industrialists; they wielded power, directly or indirectly, on a scale far out of proportion to their numbers. They were loyal to the crown now, true, but would they remain loyal? King Hadrian the Elder was smart enough to understand that his people had a pretty sweet deal, but his son was a very different story. Prince Hadrian the Younger wanted to go home to a kingdom he barely remembered, a flight of fancy that had been dismissed as absurd nonsense until the necromancers had been broken. What had once been a dream had become a political crisis, a situation that might explode no matter how he handled it. And that raised the spectre of disaster.

Louis hated being indecisive, but the stakes were too high to make a hasty decision. If he honoured his father’s agreement with the Kentigern refuges, an agreement no one had seriously expected they’d have to keep, the consequences would be severe. If he broke his word, the consequences would be disastrous. Louis knew the aristocrats were uneasy, old memories of his father crushing their revolt merging into a grim awareness of the tidal wave of revolutionary thought spreading across the continent, and if they thought their monarch could no longer rely on the Kentigerns for support they might try to revolt. Or the Kentigerns themselves might try to revolt. They had a sizable body of armed troops and experienced mercenaries and if they launched an uprising it might very well succeed. Or plunge the kingdom into civil war.

He looked up as his chamberlain stepped into the chamber. “Your Majesty, Prince Hadrian has arrived.”

Louis kept his face from showing any trace of his real emotions. “He may enter.”

The chamberlain bowed and retreated, returning a moment later with Prince Hadrian. The prince was a young man, with tanned skin, dark hair, and darker eyes that stuck out amongst the remainder of the kingdom’s nobility. He wore a simple tunic, topped with a purple robe that was – technically – illegal for anyone who wasn’t a member of the royal family. King Philip had granted King and Prince Hadrian the right to wear regal colours, something that made Louis’s blood boil. The sword at Prince Hadrian’s belt was the final indignity. Only royals and their guards could bear arms in the presence of the king and Prince Hadrian was neither. His kingdom was gone. The sooner he realised his dream was dead, the better.

Prince Hadrian went down on one knee. “Your Majesty.”

He hid his resentment well, but it was there. Louis had seen it before, in the eyes of young men who hated the idea of deferring to their social superiors, and they had wealth and power and bloodlines of their own. Prince Hadrian wasn’t poor and his family had influence, thanks to the refugees, but there were strict limits to his power. Louis knew his father had been trying to find a bride for his son, yet it had proven impossible to find someone who was both royal – or at least a high-ranking aristocrat – and willing to marry him. Prince Hadrian was both a Crown Prince, heir to a kingdom, and a pauper. He clung to his pride because it was all he had left.

“Prince Hadrian,” Louis said. He didn’t invite the younger man to rise. “You wished to speak with me?”

Prince Hadrian nodded. “Yes, Your Majesty,” he said. “I have a proposal to put before you.”

Of course you do, Louis thought. He knew most of the details already, though he knew better than to assume he knew everything. The spies in the prince’s camp might have been spotted and fed false information, or they might have simply missed something important. And can you make it any more appealing than the last one?

“You may continue,” he said, calmly.

Prince Hadrian flushed, but controlled himself. “Your Majesty, the time is ripe for a return to Kentigern,” he said. “The necromancers have been broken. Their power lies in ruins. Their armies are scattering, now that gunpowder weapons are entering the field. There is no longer any reason to delay the reconquest of my lands.”

“Your father’s lands,” Louis pointed out. He had no idea what he was going to do when Prince Hadrian’s father died. Recognising his son as king would cause problems, refusing to do so would be equally problematic. “Not yours.”

“Not yet,” Prince Hadrian agreed. “But they are my birthright.”

He went on before Louis could muster a response. “There will never be a better chance to recover our ancestral homelands,” he said. “If we act now, we will likely be able to defeat what little resistance can be offered and reclaim the lost cities without a fight. The longer we delay, however, the greater the chance someone else will slip in and take our place. If that happens …”

Louis acknowledged the point. Legally, King Hadrian was the monarch of Kentigern. Practically speaking, possession was nine-tenths of the law and the kingdom had been in the hands of a necromancer for the last sixteen years. There were already roving bands of adventurers, dissidents, younger aristocratic sons and others trying to stake a claim to the Blighted Lands, now the necromancers were gone. If someone managed to land in Kentigern and take possession, it would be very hard to dislodge them without a major war. And with the Allied Lands in such a state, it was unlikely anyone would try. Louis himself certainly had no intention of committing troops to such a gesture when he had far too many problems back home.

“On paper, your plan is sound,” he said. “In practice, regaining your kingdom will be very difficult.”

“But we can do it,” Prince Hadrian said. “I have a proposal.”

He leaned forward. “I have enough funds to hire mercenaries to bulk out my private forces. We will sail to the kingdom, regain the lost cities, and start resettling our lands. If you help us now, we will be allies for the rest of time, giving you an ally on the far side of the Inner Sea. We will also continue to provide troops and other military support to your kingdom, which will strengthen your own position. As our kingdom is rebuilt, your traders and merchants will have access to our markets, ensuring economic growth on both sides of the sea. And I will serve as your loyal friend in monarchical councils.”

Louis said nothing for a long moment. Prince Hadrian’s plans went further than he’d expected … he wondered, idly, who had drawn up the concept. It wasn’t easy to keep track of men in the prince’s inner circle, if only because he had a habit of discarding anyone who failed to show the proper respect or tried to give him laws. Whoever had helped him was no slouch, Louis conceded ruefully. There were few grounds for saying no, or even for saying yes in public while slow-walking in private. On paper, Prince Hadrian’s proposal was extremely good. And yet it would likely cause problems in the future.

He sighed, inwardly. He had no illusions how long the permanent alliance would last. There was nothing so temporary as a permanent agreement. Tidebank and Kentigern would drift apart as they confronted problems on their respective sides of the Inner Sea, their ability to support each other grossly limited by a dangerously rough body of water. Prince Hadrian was too prideful to accept being Louis’s subordinate for long, once he had a kingdom of his own. They needed something a little more solid to bind them together before it was too late.

And if we say no, there will be riots, he reflected. It had been easy to say no when the necromancers had been invincible. Now … they weren’t. There could be an uprising in the heart of my kingdom.

“There will be conditions,” he said, finally. If nothing else, it would be an excellent chance to get rid of Prince Hadrian. His younger sister was far more amiable to being led. “First, you will not draw troops from my army. Second, you will bankroll the mercenaries yourself – and you will be responsible for their behaviour within my kingdom.”

“They won’t cause trouble,” Prince Hadrian assured him. “Their payment will only be forthcoming if they behave themselves.”

Louis snorted. Mercenaries never behaved themselves. And keeping them under control was impossible even for the strongest of kings.

He leaned forward. “And you will marry my daughter,” he finished. “Her children will be the heirs to your throne.”

Prince Hadrian’s eyes went wide. He had asked for Princess Mary’s hand in marriage years ago, practically begged for a betrothal well before the young woman reached marriageable age, only to be denied. King Philip had thought it would only fuel the young man’s ambitions, and give his in-laws additional obligations to support him, and Louis tended to agree. Mary’s opinion didn’t matter. Like all royal children, her marriage was a bargaining chip in the endless game of thrones. She would marry who she was told to marry and that was the end of it.

Not that she’ll let him treat her as a brood mare and little else, Louis reflected. Mary was smart enough to be an excellent queen, if the prince was clever enough to listen to her. And as long as our bloodlines are linked, it will be hard for us to fall out completely.

“I accept,” Prince Hadrian said. He couldn’t hide his eagerness. “I shall call upon Her Highness this very evening and ..”

“I shall discuss the matter with her first,” Louis said, firmly. “If you are prepared to go ahead under these conditions, I see no reason why you shouldn’t.”

He smiled as Prince Hadrian stood and bowed, then left the chamber. The smile left his face the moment he was alone. It was a gamble, one that could easily cost his daughter her life. She’d have bodyguards and chaperones, of course, but there was a necromancer on the far side of the sea. And if it succeeded …

No matter what happens, I come out ahead, he told himself. If Prince Hadrian won, they would be linked together by blood. If he was driven from his homeland, or killed, he would never be able to try again. And my son will inherit a kingdom without another set of overmighty subjects.

But he knew, as he called for his inner council to hammer out the agreement, that the price would be terrifyingly high.

 

Chapter One

“Robin,” Eliza managed. “What have you done?”

Robin barely heard her. He was staring at the body, battered almost to a bloody pulp. The lord’s son … the lowest of the aristocracy, from what he’d heard, but so far above a common peasant that the gulf between them could never be crossed. An aristo … he’d murdered an aristo. The bastard had been trying to rape his sister and yet … he was dead, when the wretched boy’s father found out. The penalty for killing an aristocrat was death by slow torture. He’d be lucky if his sister and the rest of his family were spared. No doubt her rape would be her own fault, in the eyes of the aristocracy. A peasant girl who caught the eye of the lord’s son had no right to say no.

He swallowed hard, anger and fear bubbling within his soul. They’d been out picking mushrooms and they were quite some distance from their home, but … given time, someone would come looking for the missing boy and discover his corpse. He’d been lucky he’d seen the asshole drag his sister into the bushes and press her against the tree and … the memories were blurred, obscured behind rage that someone – anyone – would dare put his hands on his little sister. He didn’t regret killing the aristo – some people just needed killing – but there was no way escape the consequences. For all he knew, the lord’s men were already on the way.

“We need to get out of here,” he said. There was no way to go back home, not without bringing doom on their entire family. His father and stepmother, their conjoined family, his aunts and uncles and cousins and in-laws … how many would pay the price for what he’d done? “But where can we go?”

He tried to force himself to think. Their village was on the border between Dragora and Tidebank. The closest city-state was tens of miles away, he thought, and there was no way to be sure of reaching it in time. There was also no guarantee the city authorities wouldn’t hand them back to their former lord, not when they were guilty of far more than just leaving the farm and denying their master their labour. They could go into the forest, he supposed, and live off the land, but there was no guarantee they’d be safe there either. They’d be considered bandits and treated accordingly and …

Eliza took a breath, one hand playing with her blonde hair. “You remember who passed through the village yesterday?”

Robin blinked. “The mercenaries?”

He felt a flicker of disgust. The mercenary band had behaved itself, surprisingly, but the women had still been hidden in the forest while the menfolk prepared for trouble. There hadn’t been any, unless one counted the recruiting officer making his pitch to the young men. The promises of adventure and wealth had sounded attractive, Robin had thought, but anyone who went off to become a mercenary was almost always disowned from his family. They would certainly never be welcome in their village again. And yet …

“Yes.” Eliza met his eyes. “There’s nowhere else even remotely safe now.”

“Yeah,” Robin conceded. They might be safe, if they could get to the camp in time. Was it even still there? “Are you sure …?”

His sister looked back at him. They made an odd pair: he’d inherited his father’s short and stocky build, while his sister was taller, with long blonde hair that fell down her shoulders and covered her tunic. It was easy to believe they weren’t actually related, even though they were full siblings. No doubt the would-be rapist hadn’t realised Eliza wasn’t actually unprotected. He wouldn’t have known Robin was her brother.

“Where else can we go?”

The question hung in the air for a long moment. Robin had no answer. They had to run – and fast. They didn’t dare go back to the village for fear of leading the hunters back there too, they didn’t even dare send a message to their parents. Not yet … he swallowed hard, wishing he’d stayed close enough to warn off any predators before it was too late. The blood on his fists was a grim reminder his life had changed forever, that they would soon be hunted animals …

“Nowhere,” he said, finally. He checked the body, removing a handful of coins and pocketing them before dragging the corpse under a bush and leaving it there. There was no time to dig the wretched man a grave. “Let’s go.”

He forced himself to start walking, silently grateful they’d wandered so far from the village. The paths through the forest were rougher here, making life harder for anyone who wanted to give chase. The lord’s men weren’t good woodsmen, he’d been told, and unless they had a magician they’d have some problems following then through the tangled undergrowth. He paused by a river to wash the blood from his hands, just to be sure, and paddled upstream long enough to confuse any dogs that might be trying to catch a whiff of his scent. The peasants had spent years learning how to hide themselves in the forest, poaching deer and other animals reserved for the aristocracy, and they knew all the tricks. It was unlikely they could be tracked down before it was too late.

Unless the mercenaries refuse to take us in, he thought, grimly. Mercenaries had a bad reputation, with reason. They might refuse to accept Robin and Eliza – or, worse, they might refuse him and accept her alone. His imagination provided too many possibilities, each one worse than the last. Perhaps it would be better to make their way to the nearest city instead, changing their names and hoping to hell the lord’s men didn’t have a magician with them. If we make the wrong call …

“We can write a letter, once we reach the camp,” Eliza said. “Or ask someone to take a message for us.”

Robin shook his head. There were few in the village who would openly admit to being able to read, after the local lords banned the New Learning, and even if they took the risk it was hard to imagine what they could write without incriminating themselves. Hell, the mere act of receiving a letter would raise eyebrows. Their family had friends and relatives in the surrounding villages, but none more than a few hour’s walk from home. Who would send a letter to them?

Guilt gnawed at his heart and soul. His father would never know what had happened to them. Would he suspect the truth? Or would he think they’d wandered into the wrong part of the forest and slipped away from human ken? Or even that they’d fled to the city … it wasn’t impossible, he told himself. They’d hardly be the first to ensure their families could maintain plausible deniability, while they left in search of a better life elsewhere. He’d go back one day, he promised himself, and make it right. But he had no idea where he could even begin.

The forest parted suddenly, revealing a camp set up next to the border road. Robin sucked in his breath as he saw the wooden stockade, clearly harvested from the surrounding trees, and the trench surrounding a multitude of brightly-coloured tents. The camp hadn’t been there a few days ago, he knew for a fact, which made its rapid construction all the more impressive. It looked alarmingly permanent, for a camp belonging to a mercenary troop passing through the area, and it made him wonder if they were making a terrible mistake. Their lord might have hired the mercenaries to keep his serfs in line.

He gritted his teeth. “This way.”

The air shifted, slightly, as they walked out of the forest and made their way down to the gate. A pair of guards were standing there, wearing tunics and carrying gunpowder weapons slung over their shoulders. Robin had expected ravening monsters, orcs in human form, but they looked surprisingly normal. They stood like men who had nothing to prove, to themselves or anyone else. They were far more manly than the lord’s dead son, who had dressed up as a fighting man and fooled absolutely no one. He certainly hadn’t put up much of a fight when Robin had been pounding him.

“Yes?”

Robin blinked. He’d never heard an accent like that before. The peddlers spoke in a multitude of different accents, and the aristos liked to speak in a manner he found hard to emulate, but the mercenary’s accent was something else again. He had no idea where the man had come from or if he had anywhere to go, if he ever left the band. It was just another reminder he was about to step into a very different world.

“We heard the recruiting sergeant yesterday,” Robin said, grasping helplessly for words. It didn’t seem wise to tell the guard the full truth. “We’d like to sign up.”

The guard studied them for a long moment. “Very well,” he said, simply. “Come with me.”

He turned and led them into the camp, two other guards appearing out of a tent to take his place and several others watching from a safe distance. Robin looked around with interest, noting the dozens of men – all wearing similar tunics – running laps or performing push-ups or practicing with muskets or bladed weapons. They looked back at him, a handful eying Eliza with frank interest. Robin felt his fists clench in a fit of sudden rage and forced himself to unclench them, reminding himself that they couldn’t afford to get into a fight here. It would get them both killed, or worse. The guard stopped outside a larger tent and motioned for them to wait, before stepping in himself. There was a long pause, just long enough for Robin to start worrying in earnest, before the guard returned. His face was split by an odd little smile.

“The Captain-General will see you now.”

Robin glanced at Eliza, then stepped inside the tent. The interior was brighter than he’d expected – a shiver ran down his spine as he saw the floating ball of light hovering overhead – and it took his eyes a moment to adjust to the sudden change. Three people sat in front of a folding table, two men and a woman. They looked at him with cool appraising eyes. Robin forced himself to look back, suddenly very aware that showing weakness could easily prove fatal. The two men were impressive, more in bearing than dress, while the woman … Robin was certain, without knowing quite how, that she was a sorceress.

“Greetings,” the first man said. He was older than Robin by at least a decade, with short dark hair and a neatly-trimmed beard. “I am Captain-General Sir James Hawkwood of the Bloody Hands, This is Sergeant-Major Winter, my right hand, and Lady Sorceress Tancella …”

“Your wrong one,” Tancella said.

Robin glanced at her. She was surprisingly short, with blonde hair cropped close to her skull and bright blue eyes that were cold and hard, even when she smiled. Her outfit drew the eye to her cleavage in a manner that left Robin unsure where to look, or even if he should look at her at all, and her accent was completely unfamiliar.

“You want to join us,” Sir James said. “Why?”

“Yes … My Lord,” Robin managed. “I …”

“Sir will suffice,” Sir James said. His tone was casual, but there was an edge behind it that made Robin flinch. “Why do you want to join us?”

“I’m Robin and this is my sister Eliza,” Robin said. He didn’t care tell them the truth. “We want to join you because …”

He hesitated. “We’re too young to inherit anything,” he continued. It was true enough. Older sons inherited the farm, younger sons worked for their elder brothers or tried to find farms that would welcome another pair of masculine hands. Daughters were generally married off to other farms unless their parents didn’t have sons, in which case they were expected to find a younger son from another farm and bring him home. “If we stay, we’ll be worked to death. Joining you is a chance to see the rest of the world.”

“Is it?” Sir James smiled, rather thinly. “And the truth?”

“Sir?”

“It’s a very plausible lie,” Sir James said. “But it is a lie.”

Robin flushed. It wasn’t precisely a lie. He’d seen plenty of younger sons fall into depression – or drink – because they would never amount to anything beyond workers on their brother’s farm. He knew it could happen to him too. And Eliza … if she married poorly, she might not live long enough to regret it.

“The truth, please,” Sir James said. He spoke politely, but firmly. “Don’t waste my time.”

“I … I caught an aristo trying to rape my sister,” Robin said. He couldn’t tell if it was a mistake to confess or not. Sir James was an aristocrat, if he was any judge, but he was clearly cut from very different cloth than the local nobility. “I beat him to death. If we go home, we’ll be caught and murdered. If we go to the city” – he shook his head – “this is the only place we can go.”

“I see.” Sir James said nothing for a long moment, but his eyes bored into Robin’s. “Do you understand what you’re agreeing to?”

He continued before Robin could think of a response. “You will be trained – and harshly – until you are ready to take your place in the field. There’ll be nothing genteel about it. If you don’t come up to scratch, or you prove unwilling or unable to handle military discipline, you will be punished or expelled. And you” – his eyes moved to Eliza – “will be one of our washerwomen, doing everything from cooking and cleaning to mending shirts and tending the wounded. Again, there will be nothing genteel about it. If you don’t come up to scratch, you will be expelled.”

Eliza nodded. “Yes, sir,” she said. “I know how to cook and clean. And sew.”

“Yes, sir,” Robin echoed.

“You will belong to us, in all senses of the word,” Sir James said. “Your first loyalty will be to the Bloody Hands. Your families back home, your friends … they all come second to us. We will be resuming our march tomorrow morning, at the crack of dawn, and you may never see your home again. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, sir,” Robin managed.

“Very good,” Sir James said. “I need to speak to my inner council. Wait outside. If you change your mind”- he gave them a toothy grin – “you can walk back to the gate and the guards will let you leave. Follow the road east and it’ll take you to a city outside your kingdom. If you’re not there when we come out, we’ll let you go. If you are … there will be no further opportunities to change your mind. Understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Robin said. “And thank you.”

“Thank me after you see your first battle,” Sir James said. He pointed at the flap. “Not before.”

***

James kept the stern expression on his face until Robin and Eliza had left the tent, then allowed himself a moment of amusement. The two peasants had told a convincing story, but James had years of experience dealing with far more practiced liars and the tells were all too visible. Their second story had been true, he was sure, and it added an amusing little wrinkle to the whole affair. He could hardly condemn Robin for killing a would-be rapist. It was a very minor issue compared to his own crimes.

“He reminds you of you, doesn’t he?” Sergeant-Major Winter didn’t mince words. “You do realise this could land us in hot water?”

“I doubt it.” James had met the local lord, a man whose pretensions cloaked deep insecurity and very limited power. He could bully a peasant village, perhaps, but five hundred armed mercenaries could take his castle easily and put everyone inside to the sword. “No one is going to pick a fight with us over two runaways, even if they do realise the poor kids came here.”

“The girl may have talent,” Tancella put in. “I’d like to test her, if you don’t mind.”

James nodded, knowing the sorceress would do it anyway. There was no point in issuing orders you knew wouldn’t be followed. Besides, the band could always do with more magicians. It was rare for a second-rank magician to sign up for more than a year or two and almost unknown for a first-rank to join up at all. Tancella was the only one he’d met who’d stayed for over five years and he had no idea why. He’d never bothered to ask. For all he knew, her story was comparable to his own.

“I’ll see what we can make of them,” Winter said. “Just don’t get too blinded by the kid’s likeness to you.”

“Hah.” James shrugged. One recruit would hardly save or damn the company. He probably had more of a soul than most mercenaries, and the fact he’d defended his sister spoke well of him, but … he was unpolished. Physically strong, like most farmers, yet probably lacking in any real military training. “You take him to the platoon, make sure he gets thrown in at the deep end. Sink or swim.”

“I know the drill,” Winter said. “And I’ll take care of him.”

Tancella grinned. “I’ll take care of the girl,” she said. “If she has the talent and a willingness to learn, I’ll make something of her.”

“Good.” James looked from one to the other. “We’re already pushing it, if we want to get to Tidebank City before the deadline. Make sure everyone is ready to march at the crack of dawn.”

“Yes, sir,” Winter said. “We’ll be there in plenty of time.”

James nodded, returning his attention to the letters in front of him as they left the tent. His thoughts were elsewhere. Winter wasn’t wrong to say that Robin reminded James of himself, a young man who had committed an awful crime by the standards of the aristocracy … not, James acknowledged, that his crime had been as vile as the one James himself had committed. Reason enough to give Robin and his sister a second chance, he supposed, and there was little real risk of the local lord realising what had happened in time to stop them. If the body had been hidden, it might not be found until the band was well on the way to Tidebank.

And if the whole affair works out in our favour, he told himself, it’ll be all the better for us.

 

Chapter Two

“Last chance,” Robin muttered to Eliza. “Do you want to stay?”

“Yeah,” Eliza said. “There’s nowhere else to go.”

Robin nodded, despite feeling oddly cold and exposed in the middle of the camp. The mercenaries didn’t seem to be paying attention to them, but he’d seen enough strangers being watched by his fellow villagers to know what it felt like to watch someone without making it obvious. Everyone who passed by glanced at them, some eying his sister in a manner that made his blood boil and others weighing him up as if his fate rested in their hands. It might, he reflected bitterly. He didn’t know much about how mercenaries conducted themselves, when they weren’t looting, raping and pillaging for money, but some of the people checking him out might be officers, ready to expel him as soon as he gave them an excuse. There was nothing certain about their position and there never would be, not now. They would never be able to go home again.

Sergeant Winter emerged from the tent. “You’re still here,” he said, in a tone that was impossible to read. “You, boy, come with me.”

Robin stiffened. “What about Eliza?”

“I’ll take care of her,” Tancella said. The sorceress was shorter than he’d realised, practically diminutive. “You take care of yourself.”

“Go,” Eliza said. “I’ll be fine.”

Robin hoped to hell she was right, as Sergeant Winter turned and marched away. A sorceress should be able to look after his sister, right? He gritted his teeth and followed the sergeant through a maze of tents, some brightly coloured and others clearly designed to bend in with the undergrowth. The men outside were doing everything from press-ups to cooking and cleaning – Robin’s lips twitched to see grown men peeling potatoes; back home, cooking was almost exclusively a female domain – but they paused long enough to salute the sergeant as he passed, before studying Robin to see if he was someone they should pay attention to. Robin felt cold, again, as they walked onwards. He’d had a place in the village, a role that brought both rights and obligations. He wasn’t sure what he had here.

“Right now, you are a maggot,” Sergeant Winter said. “You have no rank, no authority. You will not be truly part of the platoon until you master the basics of warfare, and you will not be respected by your peers until you prove yourself. Expect them to test you – and hard – until they are sure you can be trusted.”

“I can be trusted,” Robin said, heatedly. “I …”

“You have never been in battle,” Sergeant Winter said. “I’ve known muscular men break and run at the first hint of real combat, while scrawny little creatures held their ground. No one can tell how they will truly react until they stand in line, ready to break a cavalry or orc charge, knowing that if they try to flee they might survive at the cost of sacrificing their peers. You may be a great infantryman, one day, or you may break at the first challenge. Your peers do not know which you are. Not yet.”

“I will prove myself,” Robin said.

“Brave words.” Sergeant Winter sounded amused. “I've heard them before, from the highest to the lowest. Some made it. Some didn’t.”

He paused. “They will test you. You’ll hate it. Try not to let it get under your skin. Being calm in combat is a skill you’ll need to master, if you want to make it.”

Robin swallowed. “I can be calm.”

“I’ve heard that before too,” Sergeant Winter said. “Some made it. Some didn’t.”

He went on, calmly. “Listen to your peers, and your officers. Obey orders. Learn!”

“Yes, sir,” Robin said.

“Yes, Sergeant,” Sergeant Winter said. “I work for a living.”

“Sergeant?”

“Old joke.” Sergeant Winter smiled, rather humourlessly. “You’ll understand one day.”

He straightened up. “You’re being assigned to 1st Company, 1st Platoon. They lost a private last week so they can have you as a replacement. Listen to them, and learn.”

Robin didn’t want to know, but he asked anyway. “They lost a private?”

“He went out one evening and never returned,” Sergeant Winter said. “We searched, of course, and found nothing. Deserted, perhaps, or murdered. It wouldn’t be the first time someone was lured away from his comrades and wound up dead. I know men who got very drunk and had their throats slit by footpads, or whores. You have to fit in with your platoon because, once you prove yourself, they’re the only friends you’ll have. The rest of the world hates us.”

He paused outside a large tent and whistled. A tall man with a decidedly aristocratic air – and a nasty scar running down his cheek – stepped out, his face darkening when he saw Sergeant Winter. Robin couldn’t tell if the taller man genuinely disliked the sergeant or if he was just irked at being disturbed, but he suspected it didn’t manner. An annoyed officer might just take it out on his new recruit.

“This is Lieutenant Hans Gruber, platoon commander,” Sergeant Winter said. “Lieutenant, this is Robin of No Fixed Abode. Your new recruit.”

Gruber looked Robin up and down. “No Fixed Abode?”

“We … ah … ran away from home, sir,” Robin said. “There’s nothing left for us back there.”

“Good.” Gruber’s tone hardened. “Any fighting experience?”

Robin hesitated. “Just a handful of fights in the fields, sir.”

“Hah.” Gruber sounded utterly unimpressed. “Peasants don’t know how to fight, or they’d have destroyed the aristos a long time ago. Not promising material.”

He studied Robin for a long moment. “Show me.”

“What?”

“Show me.” Gruber raised his fists. “Fight me. That’s an order.”

Robin glanced at Sergeant Winter, who nodded … and then jumped backwards, just in time, as Gruber aimed a punch at his jaw. The man was stronger and faster than he looked… Robin clenched his fists, unsure what to do. Should he try to take the officer down or …?

“You’ll never have a better chance to put me down, maggot,” Gruber said. “You’ll come to hate me shortly, and all the officers under my command, but you’ll never be allowed to take a swing at me again. Or are you just another coward who’ll talk big while doing nothing to keep his baby sister from being raped …? You want to watch as her legs are forced open and the rapist puts a baby in her with his cock …”

Robin threw himself at the officer, driven more by anger than rational thought. Gruber blocked his first punch effortlessly, before tripping him up and sending him sprawling to the ground. Robin rolled over and came upright, trying to punch the officer in the face … Gruber caught his arm, yanked him forward, and pulled the arm behind his back. Robin screamed – the pain was agonising – and tried to pull free. But it was already too late.

“Basic brawler, lead with your fists.” Gruber didn’t sound angry, just analytical. “No real fighting training, good. Less to unlearn. You need to control your temper too. The enemy will try to provoke you and if you let them get to you, you’ll make mistakes.”

He stepped back, letting Robin go. “Do you want to come at me again?”

“No, sir,” Robin said. He had already started to dislike the officer, but he was sure that trying to throw another punch would end badly. “I want to learn.”

“Good answer, maggot,” Gruber said. His eyes flickered to Winter. “I’ll take care of him, Sergeant. He’ll be ready to fight soon or broken.”

“Good luck,” Sergeant Winter said.

Gruber motioned for Robin to follow him into the tent. The air inside was heavy, smelling faintly of too many men in too close proximity. The ground was covered with bedrolls, neatly laid out in a single line. Knapsacks rested at one end – Robin guessed they were makeshift pillows – and blankets, folded as neatly as the bedrolls, were piled at the far end. A handful of bladed weapons were clearly visible, but otherwise it was little different from the time he’d slept in a barn with a bunch of other young men. He felt a rush of optimism. He could do this. They could do this.

“Listen carefully, because I’m only going to say this once,” Gruber said. “There are rules for maggots. You will follow them until I tell you otherwise. You will do exactly as you are told. You will not bring alcohol into the tent or anything else that might impede your ability to carry out your duties. You will respect and learn from your comrades. If you have a problem with any of them, you can settle it in the boxing ring. Got me?”

Robin nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“You will be issued everything you need, from uniforms to weapons. You will take care of them – we will show you how – and you will be billed for every replacement unless you manage to convince me otherwise. Your wages will be paid into the regimental accounts – the paymaster will take care of it – and held in escrow for the first month. If you have any money with you, add it to the accounts. Maggots do not get to hold money. It keeps them from gambling.”

“Sir?”

“Infantrymen love to gamble,” Gruber said. “But it is very easy to get into debt. There are rules around gambling, which we’ll discuss later. For now, you are forbidden to engage in gambling and if you are caught trying it anyway you will regret it. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good.” Gruber gave him a predatory smile. “Your training begins now.”

He wasn’t kidding, Robin discovered very quickly. Gruber marched him outside and started running through basic drills, everything from marching in line to press-ups and other forms of exercise. A handful of other men joined them, making ribald remarks as they watched Robin being put through his paces; Gruber ordered them to join the march so they could show Robin what they’d learnt over the last few months. Robin quickly found himself covered in sweat, his muscles aching as he stretched them in new and unfamiliar directions. His new comrades didn’t seem anything like as troubled by the march, any more than their commanding officer. Robin had been told that aristocratic officers stayed in the rear, sipping fine wine while their men fought and died, but Gruber seemed to lead by example. He did everything he ordered Robin to do and more besides.

“It’ll get easier, maggot,” Gruber assured him. “And then the real pain will begin.”

Robin barely had a second to catch his breath before he was whisked to the regimental office, where a scribe took down his details and asked a number of very incisive questions, then to the paymaster’s tent to arrange for his wages. The paymaster took the money Robin had stolen and added it to the accounts without question, then passed Gruber a receipt. Robin’s new commander stuffed it in his pocket, then led the way to the quartermaster. The older man – Robin would never have guessed he was a military officer if he’d met him anywhere else – outfitted Robin with a knapsack and bedroll of his own, then offered useful advice on how to carry it. Robin couldn’t help thinking it was the strangest conversation he’d ever had.

“Remember to follow orders,” Gruber said, as they entered the next tent. “This isn’t the place to argue.”

“Yes, sir,” Robin said.

The chirurgeon was a strict, no-nonsense man. “Strip.”

Robin blinked, then forced himself to undress. He had grown up on a farm and he was used to the complete lack of privacy, but the chirurgeon wasn’t family and … he had to force himself to remove his undergarments and put them on the ground. The chirurgeon looked Robin up and down, then poked and prodded at his body while snapping out a series of questions, each one more intimate than the last. Robin found it hard to think clearly, which might have been the point. It was harder to lie, no matter how humiliating it was to admit he was a virgin. The only girl he’d kissed had refused to go any further, no matter how he’d begged and pleaded.

“He seems clean,” the chirurgeon said, when the whole exercise was done. “You can make a man of him.”

Gruber snorted. “Get into your uniform,” he said. “Your old outfit will be burnt.”

Robin opened his mouth to object, then caught himself. There was no point in keeping the farmer’s tunic. Traditionally, they were passed down from wearer to wearer, patched up time and time again to the point it was difficult to say if anything of the original garment remained. His father and his grandfather had worn it, or something very much like it … he felt another pang of guilt. He was never going to see his father again.

“Yes, sir,” he said, finally.

Gruber kept him busy for the rest of the day, alternating between tasks like fetching and carrying water to weapons training with wooden swords and shields. A handful of other officers and sergeants came and went, some pushing Robin in directions he’d never thought to go and others making snide remarks designed to get under his skin. He had to fight, sometimes, to keep from exploding in rage. The only thing that kept him from losing it was the grim awareness he might be expelled if he lashed out, and who would take care of Eliza then? He dreaded to think what would happen if she remained in the camp without him.

The thought drove him onwards, as they paused long enough for dinner – a meaty stew served with bread and water – and then returned to the training field. Robin didn’t understand how Gruber could keep going, or why he was expending so much of his time on a single recruit. Didn’t he have something else to do? Robin didn’t know. The ache in his muscles was growing almost unbearable, yet he refused to give in as long as Gruber kept going. It was too much and yet …

It was a relief when he was finally walked back to the tent. A handful of mercenaries were already there, a couple snoring loudly and the rest cleaning weapons or repacking their knapsacks. They looked up as Robin entered, their eyes lingering on his clean uniform and lack of any rank stripes. They knew he was new … Robin told himself not to be silly. Of course they knew he hadn’t been there yesterday. He was so tired he wasn’t thinking straight.

“This is our new maggot,” Gruber said. Robin was getting sick of that word. “Make him welcome. Make sure he knows what he’s doing. And Khan, if I see you open that bottle I’ll have you flogged.”

Robin flinched. Gruber’s tone hadn’t changed at all.

“We’re marching out tomorrow, so be ready at Second Reveille,” Gruber continued. “Khan, you can show our new maggot what to do. And then put him to bed.”

“Yes, sir,” a young man said. “Would you like me to read him a bedtime story too?”

Gruber eyed him darkly. “Yes,” he said. “And tuck him in nicely.”

He turned and left the tent. Robin flushed, helplessly, as Khan eyed him. He was easily the darkest person Robin had ever met, with dark skin and darker eyes that sparkled with mischief. He wore the same uniform as Robin, but there was a single stripe on his left arm. Robin guessed it marked him out as a private. He promised himself he’d earn the same stripe as quickly as possible.

“Welcome to hell, maggot,” Khan said. He waved a hand around the interior, pointing briefly to each mercenary and saying their names. “You have a lot of work to do.”

Robin nodded. If he hadn’t known it, he would have learnt over the last few hours. He didn’t argue as Khan showed him how to put his bedroll down and lay his bed, then go to the makeshift washroom to clean himself before actually going to sleep. Khan kept speaking, outlining everything a soldier needed to know now he’d been assigned to a platoon … there was so much of it that Robin found it hard to keep track, leaving him afraid he’d missed a crucial detail in the babble. Khan didn’t seem to care.

“You’ll get used to it,” Khan assured him, when they were back in the tent. “Get some rest, maggot. We’ll be on the march tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir,” Robin sad. He wasn’t sure if he should address Khan as sir or not, but it was better not to take chances. “Does it get any easier?”

“Of course not.” Khan said. “The training will get harder and harder until you prove yourself or you wind up dead. Sweet dreams.”

He watched as Robin lay down on the bedroll – it was oddly more comfortable than his bed back home – and then drifted away to his own sleeping place. Robin closed his eyes, feeling utterly unsure of himself. He’d been a farmer in the morning and now … he and his sister were mercenaries. He wondered what had happened to Eliza – he hadn’t seen her over the last few hours – and cursed himself for not asking. Gruber might or might not have told him, as the officer was clearly a more complicated man than Robin had thought, but he couldn’t answer a question he’d never been asked. And now he had no idea where she was or what had happened to her.

Robin gritted his teeth. They were alone now. They would never see home again. And that meant they had to fit in with the rest of the band, whatever the cost. And that meant …

His body was aching and his mind was tired, but it still felt like hours before he drifted off to sleep.

 

Chapter Three

Eliza had always prided herself on being the more practical one of the duo – and indeed one of the most practical children in the combined family. She had always known, for example, that she wouldn’t spend the rest of her life on the farm, nor that she wouldn’t be permitted to remain unmarried once someone came courting. Being a farmer’s daughter meant understanding the grim realities of existence, including the simple fact everyone had to work to keep the farm and the surrounding communities alive. There was no point in mourning the life she’d lost in less than a day, when the wretched aristo brat had tried to rape her. She was too practical to waste time when all that mattered was survival, for her and her older brother. And that meant she had to gamble everything on joining a mercenary band.

She watched Robin leave, then turned her eyes to Tancella. Up close, the sorceress was short and alarmingly thin, suggesting she’d grown up in a poor community. Eliza knew quite a few young girls who hadn’t had anything like enough to eat when they’d been children, resulting in them looking scrawny even after they passed through adolescence and reached adulthood. It wasn’t uncommon in farming communities, where one bad harvest could result in starvation, but she couldn’t help thinking it was odd for a sorceress. She’d always imagined them living in fancy palaces, with magic to serve their every need.

Tancella studied her back, her cold blue eyes seeming to bore into Eliza’s soul. It occurred to Eliza to wonder if Tancella could actually read her mind, something that might be possible with magic, but she didn’t dare ask. There was no such thing as physical privacy on the farm – everyone knew when she and her sisters had their monthly cycles – and that was quite bad enough, yet the idea of having her thoughts extracted and read was a great deal worse. If Tancella was reading Eliza’s mind, she showed no sign. Instead, she merely nodded and beckoned for Eliza to follow her. Eliza couldn’t help thinking that Tancella walked almost like a man.

“This is my tent,” Tancella said, as they stepped though a flap. The interior was lit with magic, revealing a folding table, a chair and a simple bedroll lying on the floor. “Take a seat.”

Eliza obeyed, feeling unsure of herself. She’d never dared go near the hedge witch’s hut in the forest and Tancella was an actual sorceress, someone who could turn her into a toad with the flick of a finger or … do something else, equally horrible, if Eliza offended her in some way. She didn’t know much about the limits of magic, but the village was still talking about the young man who had offended the witch and spent the rest of his days as a donkey … never mind it had happened years before her birth. What if she was turning into something …? Or …?

“You have four choices,” Tancella said, bluntly. She might be small, but she dominated the room. “First, you can be a washerwoman, doing everything from washing clothes and dishes to cooking, cleaning, and sewing. It’s a rough life, but better than nothing. Second, you can be a Captain’s Lady, in which you are effectively the wife of an officer or enlisted man … bear in mind, if you go that route, there are harsh punishments for adulterers. Third, you can be a whore …”

“No.” Eliza spoke without thinking. “I … I won’t!”

Tancella gave her an unreadable look. “If you stay as a washerwoman, you will be expected to remain celibate. If you become someone’s lady, you will be their wife … you will not be allowed to sleep with anyone else, even if you break up with your first gentleman. It’s bad for discipline. If you become a whore, you will be paid for your services …”

“You mentioned four options,” Eliza said. “What’s the fourth?”

Tancella’s eyes met hers. Eliza forced herself to look back, despite feeling as through she was staring into the very gates of hell itself. She had always known she would be married off, and that she would have to hope for a man she could grow to love, but the idea of becoming a whore, of selling her body for a few coins, was disgusting. She’d heard the stories from men who’d visited bigger towns, where there was always a brothel or two, and they were just horrific. There was no way she’d sell herself, even if the alternative was starving to death. She wouldn’t!

“I need an apprentice,” Tancella said. “An assistant, who will be paid in training. Have you ever been tested for magic?”

Eliza shook her head. Her village had been on the borderland and it was rare, almost unknown, for someone to be tested unless they showed overt signs of magic or other supernatural powers. She knew one person who had been taken away by a travelling magician – she had no idea what had happened to him – but otherwise … she swallowed hard, flowering hope mingling oddly with bitter realism. She’d never shown any signs of magic. She was sure she would have noticed.

Tancella reached for a bag and opened it, revealing a small silver needle. “Give me your hand.”

Eliza hesitated, then held out her hand. Tancella took it in a surprisingly strong grip and held it steady, then poked the tip of Eliza’s middle finger with the needle. Eliza yelped in pain and tried to pull back, but Tancella’s grip was too strong to break. The needle started to glow a moment later, an eerie luminescence that sent chills down her spine. It was magic. Her magic.

“Congratulations.” Tancella sounded neither pleased nor displeased. “You have magic.”

“I …” Eliza sucked in her breath. “Why … why didn’t I know?”

“You’re not strong enough, yet, to have outbursts of accidental magic,” Tancella said, studying the needle. “You might never be that strong, but you do have a talent. You’ll need some training, I’m afraid, yet … you could make something of yourself.”

Eliza swallowed. If she had magic …

“You have to make your choice,” Tancella said. Was there a hint of sympathy in her tone? Eliza wasn’t sure. “You have four options. Choose.”

“I …” Eliza forced herself to start again. “What should I know, before I make my choice?”

Tancella shrugged. “Being a woman in a mercenary band isn’t easy. This regiment is better than most, but you will still be pushed to the limit. The risks of falling into enemy hands are small, yet … they cannot be denied. You could wind up dead, or gang-raped, or enslaved. And once you choose a role, you will be stuck with it.”

She paused. “It has to be your choice.”

Eliza nodded. She didn’t really have to think about it. Being a washerwoman would be boring and that was the best of the three original options. She had no intention of selling herself, either to a single person or to the entire camp, and even if she did she was fairly sure she’d be doing a lot of washerwoman duties anyway. It would be efficient and she had a feeling Sir James was all about efficiency. Tancella’s offer of training, in exchange for service, was the best she had. She suspected it had been deliberately presented that way, to ensure she’d accept it.

“One final question,” she said. “How did you come to join the band?”

“I’ll tell you that when I know you a little better,” Tancella said. “For now, make your choice.”

“I’ll be your student,” Eliza said. She knew the choice had been inevitable right from the start. “When do we begin?”

“Right now.” Tancella reached for a wand and held it out. “You need to learn to channel magic before you can go any further.”

Eliza nodded, slowly, and took the wand. She had expected it to feel warm in her hand, right for her, but instead it was just a piece of wood. Except … there was something there, resting within the wand. She ran her finger down the wood and felt something respond to her, something that felt both strange and familiar.

“There are several different ways to do this,” Tancella said. “The simplest is also the most unpleasant. It can be uncomfortable even if it doesn’t hurt. Do you want to try that method or would you rather something more comfortable, but less reliable?”

“The simplest,” Eliza said. She was used to pain. “How do you do it?”

“Hold the wand out, in front of you.” Tancella stood and walked behind Eliza, her fingertips gently pressing against her skull. “And feel the magic flowing into you.”

Eliza gasped, her head swimming as Tancella’s magic flowed into her brain and out into the wand, illuminating her own magic in the process. She was suddenly very aware of the older woman’s true power, of the sheer magnitude of the magic lurking within her tiny body … and how long it would take for Eliza to match her, if she ever did. Tancella withdrew a moment later, leaving Eliza’s head feeling as though it had been carved open and the wounds left to fester … she felt dizzy, just for a moment, as her thoughts spun out of control. Her magic was a tiny flame ignited by a far greater inferno … she feared, just for a second, that it would splutter out and die. She knew how easy it was for a small flame to be snuffed out, before the kindling caught fire and if it happened to her …

A rush of anger shot through her. She had magic and she’d never known … how would her life have been different, she asked herself, if she’d known from the start? The wretched aristo would never have dared try to rape her, for one; she could have joined the hedge witch, or gone to magic school, or become a great lady in her own right … why hadn’t she known the truth? Had her father suspected something? Or her stepmother? Or … had they kept it to themselves? Why?

“It’s a start,” Tancella said. “Now, try to focus your magic and pour it into the wand.”

Eliza pushed her anger aside and forced herself to concentrate. Her magic was a slippery thing, a shadowy presence at the back of her mind that was hard to grasp and steer in the right direction … it felt as if she could barely muster any power, even as the first spark of magic slipped into the wand. The tip lit up brightly. Eliza sucked in her breath. She had magic! She really did!

“Well done.” Tancella’s tone didn’t change. It was hard to tell if she was being sincere or sarcastic. “Do you know how it works?”

She didn’t wait for an answer before launching into a lecture. Eliza tried to follow it, but rapidly found herself out of her depth. Spellforms? Spellware? Magitech and spell diagrams and warding patterns and runic wands and a hundred other pieces of gibberish that she knew had to be important and yet couldn’t even begin to follow … her head hurt as she tried to work out what she was being told. It was impossible. It was …

Tancella cocked her head. “Do you understand so far?”

Eliza hesitated, unsure if she should admit the truth. She knew some apprentices who had been beaten for not listening to their masters and she dreaded to think what Tancella might do to her if she thought Eliza was being disrespectful. And yet, there was no way she could bluff her way through if Tancella started asking questions. Her ignorance would be exposed and she’d wind up in worse trouble than if she’d admitted the truth.

“No,” she said, finally. “I lost track of the conversation.”

“Good.” Tancella nodded, more to herself than anyone else. “You’re smart enough to admit what you don’t know.”

“That was a test?” Eliza wasn’t sure how she felt about that. “Why …?”

“I have to assess you for common sense, which is very uncommon amongst magicians, before we proceed,” Tancella told her, rather sarcastically. “Better you get those mistakes out the way now, before you start messing around with more powerful magic. I know too many students who didn’t manage to master common sense before they started experimenting with something they couldn’t even begin to handle.”

“Oh,” Eliza said. “What happened to them?”

Tancella looked her in the eye. “They died. The lucky ones killed themselves. The unlucky ones took someone else with them.”

Eliza swallowed, helplessly.

“I’ll be giving you exercises to do, and you will practice them every time you have a free moment,” Tancella said. “You need to build up your magic before we can start experimenting with real spells. You will also be assisting me … can you read or write?”

“Not very well, and just the new alphabet,” Eliza admitted. A passing peddler had started to teach a handful of the village youths, in hopes they’d be able to master it before he had to move on, but the local lord had driven him away before it had been too late to keep the knowledge from spreading. “I can learn.”

“You will,” Tancella told her. There was a nasty glint in her eye. “Come with me.”

Eliza followed, passing a maze of tents before reaching a small stockade that isolated one part of the camp from the rest. A guard stood outside the gate, nodding politely to Tancella before stepping aside to allow them to enter. The interior was little different from the outside, with dozens of tents in plain view, but most of the inhabitants were women. There were only a handful of visible men, all standing in front of a pair of tents. Eliza sucked in her breath as she realised they were waiting to see the whores. They looked almost … hungry and not in a good way, reminding her far too much of her would-be rapist.

“You’ll be sleeping in my tent,” Tancella said, firmly. “You won’t have time for washerwoman duties, unless I am displeased with you, but you need to meet everyone else anyway.”

She kept walking, briefly introducing Eliza to a handful of people. An older woman who was in charge of the washerwomen, a handful of wives belonging to various officers, a pair of young women with terrifyingly old eyes … Eliza saw their outfit and knew they were whores. One wasn’t much older than herself, she thought, but her body was a shattered ruin and her eyes were dead. There didn’t seem to be anything her fellow women could do for her. Eliza suspected they hadn’t even bothered to try.

“I don’t want you sleeping around,” Tancella said, as they stepped into a larger tent. “If you do” – she ignored Eliza’s squawk of indignation – “make sure you take the right potions first. You do not want to get pregnant here.”

Eliza flushed. She knew how it worked, because she’d grown up on a farm, but still …

“I’m a virgin,” she protested. She had never let anyone get close to her, not willingly. “I … I wouldn’t go sleeping around.”

Tancella snorted. “You’ll be surprised how many young magicians say the same thing, only to change their minds a few months later,” she said. “And if they don’t have the sense to take precautions they reap the rewards nine months after that.”

Eliza kept her thoughts to herself as she was issued a new set of clothes, a handful of supplies and a knapsack to keep them in before they walked back to Tancella’s tent. The sorceress kept talking, pointing out the details of the camp and commenting on some of the newer weaponry the mercenaries had recently obtained. Eliza had heard of gunpowder weapons, of course, but she wasn’t sure what to make of Tancella’s claims the firearms would eventually change the world beyond repair. It seemed unlikely a simple stick could throw a ball hard enough to hurt. But a day ago the thought of her having magic would have been unthinkable too.

“You know how to cook, I take it?”

The question caught Eliza by surprise, but she answered it honestly. “Yes … ah … how should I address you?”

“Lady Sorceress will suffice, at least until you earn your robes,” Tancella said. “At that point, we shall see.”

She paused, then led the way into the tent. “You’ll be helping me prepare potion ingredients this afternoon, then watching me brew them. Follow my instructions to the letter and don’t deviate. Some potions are very forgiving, but most healing potions are not.”

Eliza nodded. “Yes, Lady Sorceress.”

“Very good.” Tancella showed a hint of a smile. “Ask questions, if you want. I shall listen to them with interest. I may even answer them.”

“How long does it take to learn magic?”

Tancella considered the question. “You can learn basic spells fairly quickly, if you kept working on boosting your magic,” she said, after a moment. “A young student can master enough magic to do serious damage with a few weeks of study and some imagination, simply through memorising the spell diagrams. However … it takes much longer to master the underlying theory of magic that’ll allow you to alter the spells as you please, or devise new ones. To be honest” – she shrugged – “most magicians, the really driven ones, spend their entire lives learning. There are no limits to how far you can go, if you try.”

“I will,” Eliza promised.

“You have a long way to go,” Tancella said. “And you don’t know it. Not really.”

She allowed herself a hint of a smile. “We’ll see how you do,” she added. “But until you master the underlying theory you’ll always be at a disadvantage compared to magicians who have. So learn.”

 

Chapter Four

It was a basic rule of thumb, James had discovered over nearly fifteen years as a mercenary warlord and leader of men, that it was unwise to ask your troops not to do anything you wouldn’t do yourself. An officer who lorded it over his men, who devoured fancy meals while they ate scraps or rode a horse while they marched on foot, was an officer who couldn’t expect any respect or liking from the men under his command. They wouldn’t put in more than the bare minimum, if they disliked or hated the officer, and they certainly wouldn’t fight to the death if they thought their commander would abandon them at a moment’s notice. Or send them to their certain deaths just to make a point about honour. James knew what he’d do to any officer who suggested he threw his life away for nothing and he was fairly sure most of his men felt the same way. If he did anything of the sort, he would probably deserve a knife in the back.

He kept the thought to himself as he led the way down the road, the vanguard fanning out around him and the remainder of the regiment bringing up the rear. The march was long and boring, and he could understand perfectly why so many officers preferred to ride, but marching beside his men was a good way to show he shared their trials and tribulations. There was no officer’s mess in his camp, no brothels or other luxuries reserved for the officers alone … they shared the same food and drink as their men, slept in the same tents ... it was something his father, damn the man, would never have done for himself. He allowed himself a cold smile at the memory, although his father had been dead for fifteen years or more. The man had been capable enough, in his own way, but he’d been a poor leader of men. He hadn’t even been able to control his own wife.

The thought made him smile as he glanced back, silently checking everyone was moving in rough formation. Five hundred men – infantry, cavalry, cannoneers – followed by three hundred female washerwomen, the camp followers no military formation had ever been able to leave completely behind. James would have preferred to do just that, and if his mercenary band had been an aristocratic or monarchical unit he would have left them behind, but his troops would never have stood for it. He had enough problems convincing them to trust the paymaster to take care of their money, rather than carrying it in and out of battles to ensure it was safe. Battles had been lost before because the enemy managed to seize the supply train and James had no intention of allowing such an embarrassing defeat to happen to him. The Bloody Hands hadn’t won every battle they’d fought – no commander ever born had a string of victories and no defeats – but they had a good reputation for winning or retreating in good order, when things went wrong. He had no intention of losing that either.

His heart twisted as they made their way through a small village. The locals had seen them coming, of course, and they’d hidden. The hell of it was that they had a point. Mercenaries had few qualms about looting, raping and pillaging and their paymasters rarely, if ever, did anything about it. Few kings would punish a mercenary for crimes against the civilian population, even if they’d fought on the wrong side, when they might need the mercenaries themselves at some later date. No monarch wanted to risk alienating mercenaries to the point they wouldn’t fight for him no matter how much money he offered. James understood, all too well. How could he expect the peasants to believe his men were disciplined? Or that he’d hang anyone who stepped too far out of line.

He put the thought aside as Sergeant-Major Winter joined him. “Any trouble at the rear?”

“Nothing so far,” Winter said. James trusted Winter completely. They’d been friends for nearly a decade. “There’ll probably be some stragglers later on, but …”

He shrugged, expressively. The troops knew the dangers of getting spread out along the road, let alone getting split up from their comrades. Peasants who wouldn’t dare pick a fight with a bunch of armed mercenaries could get very aggressive if they caught a mercenary on his own and they had plenty of space to hide the bodies. James knew at least one man who had been chopped apart and then fed to the pigs … he shuddered, recalling that horror, before pushing the thought out of his mind. The bastard had deserved it, but still …

“There aren’t many newcomers in the band,” he said, simply. The Bloody Hands tried not to recruit more than a handful of newcomers at any one time. “Their comrades will keep them in line.”

Winter grinned, showing no sign of difficulty at keeping up the conversation while marching. “What do you think is waiting for us in Tidebank?”

“Good question.” James had wondered about that ever since the first message arrived, with a retainer large enough to convince him to put his fears aside and lead his men to the southern kingdom. It was rare for considerable sums of money to be offered without some kind of solid commitment and the fact it had been offered here was … intriguing. The Bloody Hands stood to make a great deal of money even if they refused the overall commission. No one would do that unless they were desperate. “Alluvia?”

“The rebels?” Winter considered the matter. “It would make a degree of sense.”

James visualised the map. Tidebank was alarmingly close to the Kingdom of Valadon, which had recently been taken over by the Alluvian Revolutionary Government. The princedoms between Valadon and Tidebank were unthreatened, so far, but it was just a matter of time before the rebels came calling. They might already be knocking at the door, if the latest reports were out of date, and there was no way the princedoms would be able to hold the rebels off for long. And then they’d have a clear path into Tidebank. James was too experienced a commander to expect the rebels to have it all their own way, but Tidebank had every reason to want to reinforce their defences as quickly as possible.

“Perhaps, but the message came from Prince Hadrian,” he mused. That was odd too … normally, the only person in the kingdom with the power to hire mercenaries was the king. Did the prince intend to overthrow his father? That would be interesting to watch, from a safe distance, but it wasn’t an operation he wanted to join. There would be too many consequences down the line for his peace of mind. “Is he in command of the defences?”

“Unknown, sir,” Winter said. “Unless they have something else in mind.”

James shrugged. “We’ll be in the city four days from now, unless something happens to slow us down,” he said. “I guess we’ll see when we get there.”

“We can extract ourselves, if need be,” Winter assured him. “It won’t be easy, but we can do it.”

“Yeah,” James agreed. The money was good, and there was no obligation to actually take the contract, and there was no shortage of other possible jobs for the regiment … the secrecy suggested it was something important, something important enough to allow them to charge a huge fee. The kingdom certainly hadn’t hesitated to pay a large retainer. “You poke around when we get there, see what you can dig up.”

Winter saluted. “Yes, sir.”

James’s puzzlement only grew stronger as they marched onwards, pausing long enough to set up a camp at evening before resuming the march the following morning. There were no signs of war, no rumours of rebel activity beyond the ever-present Leveller leaflets that were passed around the country … nothing to suggest King Louis was in trouble with his aristocracy or even that his kingdom felt particularly threatened by the revolutionary government. The local population largely hid from them, save for a pair of enterprising innkeepers who tried to sell the company several barrels of beer. James ordered his men to leave the beer behind, more out of fear of what might have been added to the brew than anything else. Mercenaries were not popular and it would be very easy to poison the beer, secure in the knowledge most mercenaries wouldn’t bother to check before it was too late. He didn’t want to lose anyone to such a petty trick.

“We’ll be there shortly,” he said, one evening. The brief staff meeting had been more of a discussion of what they didn’t know than anything productive. “And then we’ll find out what’s waiting for us.”

He smiled, coldly. If it was something special, he was sure his men could handle it; if it was a trap, perhaps masterminded by his family, he would cut his way out without hesitation. And if it was something else …

I’ll deal with it as it comes, he told himself. And then we will see.

***

Robin had thought himself used to hard work. He was a farmer’s son and he’d been put to work practically from the moment he could walk, first assisting his mother before going into the fields to tend the crops, feed the animals and hundreds of other tasks that had to be done, every day, to keep the farm up and running. He’d never realised how lucky he was until he’d joined the Bloody Hands and discovered just how much the mercenaries had to do, from digging trenches and ditches to cleaning their weapons and endlessly drilling for war. His body ached from digging the trench around the camp, but there was no let up. The only easy day, according to Gruber, was the previous day.

“This is the latest in rifle design, straight out of Heart’s Eye,” Sergeant Rufus Herger explained, as he held out the rifle for Robin to take. “Given time, you should be able to fire six to eight bullets per minute, allowing the platoon to put out enough firepower to cripple an orc charge or send the cavalry crying home to mummy. It is also more accurate than most firearms these days, although we are told the next-generations will be more accurate still.”

Robin took the rifle, staring down at the crude design. He’d seen enough rifles in the last few days to know how deadly they could be, although it was the first time he’d been allowed to hold one for himself. The weapon was lighter than he’d expected, the metal cool against his bare skin …

“Three basic rules,” Herger said. “If someone gives you a gun, you check to make sure it’s loaded. Don’t take anyone’s word for it. Even me. Do not load the weapon unless you intend to shoot it, do not – also – point it at someone unless you want to kill them. And don’t put your finger on the trigger unless you want to shoot. Some rifles are more sensitive than others and the slightest touch can set them off.”

Robin swallowed. “And then?”

“If you don’t hit anyone, you will be flogged,” Herger told him. “If you do, you’ll run the gauntlet instead.”

He took back the rifle and carefully demonstrated how to load, aim and fire the weapon. Robin watched, deeply impressed, to see just how the mechanism functioned. He’d seen the village blacksmith put together some small devices, all of which had been frowned upon by the local lord, but the rifle was an order of magnitude more complex. Herger removed the cartages, then pulled the trigger without closing the rifle. Robin whistled. The trigger was far more sensitive than he’d realised. It would be difficult to touch it without risking disaster.

“Now you try,” Herger said. “Make sure you do it properly.”

Robin’s hands fumbled as he tried to load the first cartridge. Herger watched, correcting him mildly when he made a handful of mistakes, then led the way to the makeshift firing range and let him try to shoot. The first bullet missed the target and cracked into the far wall, dropping to the ground a moment later. Robin swore and tried again. This time, the bullet grazed the target and bounced off.

“Do it slowly, at first,” Herger advised. “You’ll learn to speed up once you master the basics.”

Robin nodded and forced himself to slow down, practicing again and again until he could load the rifle reliably and shoot a moment later. His accuracy didn’t really improve – he wasn’t sure if it was because he was a poor shot or the rifle was simply not very accurate even in the hands of an expert – but Herger assured him it didn’t matter. The platoon would be putting out dozens, perhaps hundreds, of bullets in a battle, ensuring they were bound to hit something. Robin wasn’t sure he believed Herger’s tales of entire armies of cavalry simply being wiped out, but it was hard to believe anything could stand against such an onslaught. It would be like being punched in the face a hundred times over.

“The major downside with this rifle is that the needle has a tendency to break,” Herger explained. “Thankfully, the needle can be replaced fairly quickly; I’ll teach you how to do it before you take your rifle into combat. You also need to clean the weapon regularly. Can you tell me why?”

Robin hesitated. “It gets grimy?”

“It gets grimy,” Herger repeated. He sounded oddly amused. “True enough. Gunpowder residue tends to collect at the rear of the gun. A little isn’t a problem, thankfully, but it builds up and eventually jams the weapon. It’s hard to tell how many shots you can fire before the weapon does jam, so make sure you clean it every day. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Robin said.

Herger took the rifle and demonstrated how to change the needle and then clean the interior, then passed it back to Robin and watched as Robin opened the rifle and froze. There was a cartridge inside …

“See what I mean?” Herger met Robin’s eyes. “Always check the gun isn’t loaded.”

Robin shook his head in awe. He’d watched Herger open and clean the rifle and he hadn’t spotted him insert the cartridge. How the hell had he done it? Robin had seen some passing conquerors who used sleight of hand in place of magic, but … none of them had ever managed to pull the wool over his eyes so effectively. He put the cartridge aside and carefully changed the needle, then cleaned the interior. Herger watched him like a hawk.

“There is one final thing you need to bear in mind at all times,” Herger said. “This weapon – all of your weapons – are all that stands between you and a horrible death. They make the difference between victory and defeat, between your safe return home to your family and your corpse rotting away on the battlefield, left to be eaten by crows. You will carry these weapons with you at all times, at least until specifically ordered not to, and you will take care of them. If you don’t, you won’t live to regret it.”

He paused. “Dismissed. Return to the tent and sleep.”

“Yes, Sergeant,” Robin said.

He tried not to yawn as he turned and made his way back to the tent. It was hard to believe the camp hadn’t existed a few hours ago, that it had been thrown up in less than an hour by trained men and it would be dismantled, just as effectively, the following morning. His body ached painfully as he forced himself onwards, relief at finally being given a weapon mingling with guilt over not knowing what had happened to his sister. The one time he’d asked, Gruber had told him to mind his own business and concentrate on his training. The officer hadn’t been very impressed when Robin had tried to argue that his sister was his business …

“So, you got a gun,” Khan said. The darker man was standing watch outside the tent. “You know you need to piss on it, to make it fire right?”

Robin eyed him suspiciously. The mercenaries had been surprisingly welcoming, but they had teased him mercilessly. Some of their advice, he suspected, was designed to see how gullible he was rather than anything else; they’d certainly managed to send him on a wild goose chase around the camp in search of items that simply didn’t exist. Somehow, he was sure Khan’s advice was designed to be terrible too.

“If the powder gets wet, it won’t fire,” he said, crossly. Herger had pointed that out, when he’d shown Robin the basic ammunition pouch. “Pissing on the gun won’t make it any more effective.”

Khan smiled. “Worth a try,” he said. There was no anger in his tone. “You going to join me in the watering hole tonight?”

“I can’t,” Robin reminded him. The only tent that sold alcohol was firmly off limits to him and the other newcomers. “I’m still on restriction.”

“Poor bugger,” Khan said. There was absolutely no sympathy in his tone. “Get off it quickly, please. We’ll need you when we reach our destination.”

Robin nodded, and yawned. “See you in the morning,” he said. The only good thing about the endless marching and training was that he didn’t dream. “How much longer?”

“Two more days of marching, I’m told,” Khan said. His voice became a parody of motherly concern. “Good night. Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”

Robin made a rude gesture. “I taste foul,” he said. “Really, I do.”

“I am very glad to hear it,” Khan said. He smiled, although there was little true humour in the expression. “I guess that means the orcs will eat you first.”

 

Chapter Five

The one advantage of being the sorceress’s apprentice, assistant and general dogsbody, Eliza had come to realise in the last few days, was that she didn’t have to march with the infantrymen. Tancella had a wagon of her own, which she used to carry supplies from camp to camp, and she had no hesitation in ordering Eliza to remain in the back and practice summoning and shaping her magic while Tancella drove the cart down the road. Eliza had felt guilty at first about not marching, even though most of the women were allowed to ride in the wagons too, but she’d rapidly learnt to overcome it. Practicing magic left her drained, no matter how many potions Tancella forced her to take. It didn’t help that she was also expected to do everything from cutting up ingredients – and they had to be cut precisely, or they’d be worse than useless – to trying to learn to read. She went to bed exhausted and woke the following morning feeling as if she hadn’t slept at all.

She’d never thought of magic as hard work, not really. The tales suggested sorcerers could do anything with a snap of their fingers, from bewitching young maidens to turning entire armies into toads. She hadn’t realised how hard they had to work to gain even a tiny fragment of power, let alone reach the exulted position of first-rank magician. It was hard to believe she’d ever reach that level herself, given how hard it was to cast even the most basic of spells. Tancella hadn’t said anything about it, but Eliza feared she was already regretting taking Eliza as an apprentice. She should be able to assist her mistress and the truth was, no matter how badly she wanted to deny it, that she wasn’t able to do anything like enough to pay for her training.

The thought nagged at her mind as she forced herself to study the spell diagram, as if staring at the outline on the page could somehow give her the ability to cast the spell. There was a logic to the diagram, she was sure, but she lacked the background knowledge to figure it out. If she couldn’t learn to follow the writing … she scowled, shaking her head in dismay. She felt like a baby who had suddenly found herself in an adult body, struggling to cope with everything from menstrual cycles to attention from young men. She was so ignorant that she was ignorant of her own ignorance. How much did Tancella take for granted, Eliza asked herself, to the point she didn’t realise Eliza didn’t know what she was missing? She had a nasty feeling the sorceress didn’t understand the depths of her apprentice’s ignorance.

She pushed the spell diagram aside and looked around the wagon, the rear piled high with boxes and crates. The air was disturbingly hot, despite the cool breeze that tasted faintly of salt and adventure, and she felt sweat prickling on her brow as she tried to find something – anything – to distract her. She knew she needed to press on and yet it was hard, almost impossible, when every success seemed to be met by two or three failures. The outfit she’d been given – a tunic with an apprentice’s badge – felt like a sick joke. How was she remotely worthy to wear it?

And I have no idea how Robin is doing, she thought, numbly. The one time she’d asked to see her brother, Tancella had flatly refused. Robin couldn’t afford the distraction when he was learning the ropes and, she’d added, Eliza herself needed to focus on her studies. Eliza hadn’t dared push it and the one time she’d tried to sneak out of the tent, after dark, had taught her the tent was heavily warded to keep people from coming in and out. He might have been kicked out by now.

Tancella’s voice echoed through the air. “Eliza, girl, come out here.”

Eliza stood and pasted a calm expression on her face, then clambered up beside the driver’s perch. Tancella sat there, holding the reins in her hands so gently Eliza couldn’t help wondering if it was all for show. The wagon was heavily charmed to ensure the passengers had a smooth ride and there was no reason the sorceress couldn’t charm the horses too, but there was no way to be sure. Tancella had promised to teach her all sorts of tricks, including detection spells to identify magics surrounding her, yet they’d have to wait until Eliza managed to reach a certain level of power. Eliza feared she was right. Casting a single spell still left her drained. There was no way she could match Tancella when it came to raw power, let alone flexibility.

Not yet, she promised herself.

“We’re entering the outskirts of Tidebank City,” Tancella said. “What do you think?”

Eliza stared. She was used to small villages. The one time she’d been to a larger town had been as a child, and while the town had seemed immense she knew now – as a grown woman – that it hadn’t been that much bigger than the villages. Tidebank City, by contrast, was truly immense … she sucked in her breath as she realised the city rested within a natural harbour, the bright blue sea in the distance easily the largest body of water she’d ever seen. There were boats out there – no, giant ships. One was smoking so badly she feared it was on fire; the others were sailing ships right out of stories she’d heard from passing peddlers, so alien to her experience that it was hard to believe they were even real. The sheer size of the ocean stunned her. She forced herself to look down, to take in the surrounding landscape. The city’s outskirts were lined with houses, apartment block and giant warehouses, each one seemingly bigger than the last. It was just … staggering.

“They put all the houses outside the walls,” Tancella commented. “Tells you everything you need to know about the local monarch, doesn’t it?”

Eliza followed her gaze. The walls were definitely on the wrong side of the houses and apartments, the castle resting on a giant promontory that allowed it to not only look out over the city but dominate it effortlessly as well … she wondered, suddenly, just what the unlucky souls living outside the walls were supposed to do if the city came under attack. Tancella had talked about campaigns where the Bloody Hands had laid siege to cities, or taken them by storm, and they’d all featured the civilians trying to hide inside the walls. Here … she didn’t believe it was possible. She’d grown up in cramped confines, sharing a room with her sisters and stepsisters, and that had been bad enough. The idea of being confined with hundreds of strangers was far worse.

She nodded, then looked around. The townspeople weren’t scattering as they saw the marching mercenaries, although some were eying them warily even as the marching column turned away from Tidebank City and made its way along a road that seemed to surround the city. They were a very mixed lot, she noted slowly; her village had been fairly homogenous, and she’d never seen anyone very different from herself, but here there were people with dark faces and others with slanted eyes and still others dressed in outfits that made her blush. A man wearing a kilt that barely covered his buttocks, a woman wearing a dress that revealed everything she had … a child dressed as a miniature adult, right down to the sword on his belt. There were men and women dressed in finery, as if they were nobles, yet if they were truly aristocrats why were they rubbing shoulders with people who were clearly commoners? One commoner man was holding hands with an aristocratic woman … why? It made no sense.

“They’re merchants,” Tancella said, when Eliza asked. “Some wear fancy outfits to denote their status, others try to pretend they’re still commoners even though they could buy and sell a dozen aristocrats” – she chuckled, rather darkly – “if they could find a seller. Or a buyer.”

Eliza glanced at her. “I don’t understand.”

“The local aristos hate the idea of commoner merchants having more money than them,” Tancella explained. “They really hate the idea of merchants marrying their way into quality, trading money for a family name. They’ve been trying to ban the practice for years now … not always successfully. There are too many families with noble blood that don’t have a pot to piss in. They don’t want to trade their daughter to some merchant without a drop of noble blood, but …”

She shrugged, expressively. Eliza honestly didn’t see what was wrong with it. She had grown up in an environment where marrying well, for the good of the extended family, was her duty. If there was a richer farmer who was willing to pay through the nose for her, she would be encouraged to marry him. The idea of marrying a poor man for love and love alone was cute, she supposed, but what could he give her beyond children? There wasn’t any guarantee he could work on the family farm, making him just another mouth to feed. If she had a choice between marrying a rich man or a poor one, she knew which one she’d take. It was practical.

I suppose it’s different if you’re used to a higher status than me, she thought. The villagers had all been relatively equal, although children had been at the bottom and unmarried girls only a step or two above them. But for me …

She shook her head. “Why are they dressed like …?”

“They have more freedom in the cities than you do on the farm,” Tancella said. “And they want to show off a little.”

Eliza swallowed. She had been told that the streets of big cities were strewn with holes – metaphorically speaking – that waited for country folk to stumble and fall. Anyone who spent time in the cities would never be the same again, the older folks had whispered, even if they came straight back to their hometown. A man might sire bastard children and leave them behind, a woman might have many lovers … she wondered, suddenly, just how many of those stories were true. It was …

“Interesting,” Tancella said. She sounded more alarmed than thoughtful. “Look at that.”

The wagon shivered, slightly, as Tancella tightened the wards. Eliza barely noticed. She was staring at the field. It was littered with tents, too many to count, with hundreds upon hundreds of armed men carrying out weapons drill, standing guard outside the tents, or simply loitering around the field, seemingly doing nothing at all. A handful stared at her, their eyes hungry … she gritted her teeth, promising herself she’d master defensive magics as soon as possible. The village louts who had stared at her, as her breasts started to bud, were kindness incarnate compared to these human animals. They looked as if they would leap on her at a moment’s notice.

“There are at least a dozen mercenary bands here,” Tancella said, more to herself than her apprentice. “Where they all called here?”

Eliza glanced at her. “How can you tell?”

“The flags,” Tancella explained. “There’s a dozen within view – all different.”

“Oh.” Eliza looked from flag to flag. Some were gaudy to the point she couldn’t help thinking they were rather absurd, others were strikingly simple. One was nothing more than a sheet of black cloth, flapping menacingly in the breeze. “Why are they here?”

“No idea,” Tancella said. “But I suspect we’re about to find out.”

***

James had gotten his first surprise when the marching column neared its destination.

It wasn’t surprising that the kingdom would want the mercenaries to stay out of their capital city. Nothing alienated civilians more than drunken mercenaries and soldiers carousing through the streets, molesting women and stealing everything that wasn’t nailed down and the citizens of Tidebank were wealthy enough to make their king pay for it if he brought such mercenaries here. The city wasn’t remotely defensible, unless the attackers were mindbogglingly stupid, and the wealthy merchants could easily pay the mercenaries to do the hard work for them. He amused himself by calculating how best to do it as they turned onto the ring road, making their way down to the estate. They would be close enough to the city to negotiate with the monarch without too many men getting into the city and causing havoc.

The real surprise had been the sheer number of mercenaries gathered near the city. James picked out seven flags belonging to bands he’d encountered before, as friends or enemies, and five more he knew by reputation. Howard’s Toughs, Drake’s Drummers, Death’s Men … some known for being reasonably professional, others for being little more than drunken louts who were often more dangerous to their friends than their enemies. The Black Seal were professional enough, he supposed, as he spotted their flag, but they had a reputation for utter ruthlessness. His lips twisted in dark amusement. Just how ruthless did a mercenary band have to be to be considered ruthless by other mercenary bands?

There’s at least ten thousand men here, he through, as he surveyed the camp. It was likely to turn into utter disaster very quickly, with so many men in such ghastly conditions. The water would be contaminated, food supplies would run low, boredom would drive men to act out in search of something – anything – that might give them something to do. He groaned inwardly as he saw the stalls selling alcohol and the long lines of men outside brothels. This is not going to end well.

Winter nudged him. “I make fifteen other bands here, sir,” he said. “You?”

“Fuck,” James said. Combined operations were always problematic. Very few Captain-Generals liked the idea of placing themselves under another Captain-General’s command and even if they did their captains didn’t always go along with it. He certainly wouldn’t be happy placing himself under anyone else’s command, no matter how experienced they were. “Either they’re desperate or they’re expecting a great many rejections.”

A herald approached, his eyes clearly nervous. James held up a hand to slow the marching band before walking forward. The herald had probably offended someone to get the job and there was no point in making his life miserable, not when his only role was speaking for his master. Not that everyone remembered it, of course. James could name a dozen messengers who’d mysteriously disappeared, their fates somehow both unknown and yet known to everyone. The poor bastards had been guilty of nothing more than telling their superior something they didn’t want to hear.

“My Lord,” the herald said. “I have orders to show you to your camp, then you are invited to join His Highness for the mission briefing this evening. Will you attend?”

“Of course,” James said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. “It will be my pleasure.”

The herald nodded, then pointed the way to a field on the edge of the giant camp. James gritted his teeth in disgust – very little water, even less in the way of food – and made a mental note to complain to the prince about the conditions when he finally saw him. The camp was supposed to be friendly territory, but that would change very rapidly when the mercenaries started fighting over everything from water to women. He’d have to be sure to keep his men in line and, if he needed supplies, send them out in armed groups. There weren’t any other options.

Winter caught his eye as the band completed their march. “You know, this place isn’t really defensible.”

James nodded. There were no trees nearby they could cut down and turn into a stockade, no rivers or other natural barriers they could use to protect themselves. There was no way to keep the men from sneaking out, which was going to be a real problem … he’d have to make sure the captains knew to keep the infantrymen busy, just to try to keep them from doing something stupid. He hoped to hell they recalled the rules about never getting too drunk. It wasn’t remotely safe.

“Make sure the captains are warned to keep the men under control,” he said, flatly. “And put a company on duty protecting the washerwomen.”

“Yes, sir,” Winter said. “You think someone will come here?”

“Yeah,” James said. There was no way to keep whores from plying their trade, and no way to keep infantrymen from chasing whores, so he’d done what he could to put the whole business on a regulated footing. His men knew the rules and so did the whores. But outsiders couldn’t be expected to know or follow the rules and there were too many lowlifes in the giant compound for him to trust anyone would be keeping order. “Let them think us selfish. It doesn’t matter.”

Winter saluted. “Yes, sir.”

James kept his thoughts to himself as the regiment fanned out, setting up tents with practiced ease. They were lucky their assigned spot was right on the edge of the field, but it was still hardly large enough for a single regiment let alone the rest of the mercenary bands. The air was already starting to smell. It was just a matter of time before someone caught something nasty and all hell broke loose.

“I’ll go see what the prince wants,” he said, once the command tents had been raised. “They wouldn’t be offering so much money if it wasn’t important.”

“Yes, sir,” Winter said. “Do you want a honour guard?”

James considered it, then shook his head. If it was a trap, it was a very odd one. His family had ample reason to want him dead, true, but very few mercenaries would go along with a plot to stab another mercenary in the back. And besides, there were truly vast sums of money sloshing about. It was a great deal of expenditure for very little return. They’d be better off hiring magical assassins.

“I’ll take Tancella with me,” he said, instead. “If we don’t return, you know what to do.”

“Yes, sir,” Winter said. “Good luck.”

 

Chapter Six

“Interesting design,” Tancella mused. “What do you make of it?”

James wasn’t sure. Prince Hadrian’s palace wasn't just small, by the standards of such places, but also completely indefensible. It wouldn’t be hard for a relatively small band of men to get close without being noticed, then get across the lawn and through the windows before the defenders saw them coming and took up defensive positions. The idea of a crown prince in such a place was just absurd, unless the prince was in bad odour with his father and he certainly wouldn’t be hiring mercenaries if that was the case. He was certainly making no attempt to hide the mercenary army on the city’s doorstep. The stench alone would be quite enough to raise the alarm.

He shook his head as they met another herald, who escorted them through into a giant dining room that had been turned, briefly, into a briefing chamber. There was something oddly impermanent about the whole affair, the palace somehow managing to feel more like a guesthouse than an actual home; there were fewer portraits on the walls than he’d expected, something unusual in an aristocratic residence, and there weren’t many maids or manservants within eyeshot. That was downright strange. Most aristocrats prided themselves on maintaining large households, even if it meant having a small army of men doing tasks a single man could accomplish easily, and they were reluctant to downsize if there was any way to avoid it. The whole place was just … odd.

His mood didn’t improve as he looked around the makeshift briefing chamber. Nearly forty men and a handful of women, people he’d met or knew by reputation and a handful who were complete strangers. Mercenary commanders, one and all … it was worrying there were some he’d never heard of. The mercenary community was pretty big, and names and faces came and went all the time, but it was rare for someone really capable to be a complete unknown. He should have heard of them. Either they were new, which was worrying enough, or they were dangerously incompetent. But he should have heard of someone incompetent too.

“Better grab a seat,” Tancella said. “And quickly.”

James nodded and sat, close enough to the front of the chamber to be sure of hearing everything without being too close to avoid being noticed. The chamber was filling up rapidly, but the air was surprisingly quiet. Nothing too sensitive would be discussed in the open, particularly when there was no way to be certain no one was eavesdropping. There were plenty of ways to spy on someone and they didn’t all involve magic. The handful of pretty maids carrying trays of alcohol around the room were almost certainly paid to keep their ears open and report anything they heard back to their master. It was what he’d do.

And what my father did, on occasion, he mused. It really was astonishing how many aristos didn’t realise the maids had minds of their own.

He put the thought aside as a trumpet blared. “Ladies and gentlemen, honoured guests all, please stand in welcome for His Highness Prince Hadrian the Younger, Prince in Exile of Kentigern.”

James sucked in his breath as he stood. He’d heard of Kentigern … a kingdom on the far side of the Inner Sea, a kingdom that had been destroyed by the necromancers long ago. It had never occurred to him that Prince Hadrian might not be a Prince of Tidebank; the name was hardly uncommon in the middle kingdoms and it was rare, almost unknown, for a prince-in-exile to be permitted to act so freely without being brought up sharply. What did it mean, he asked himself, as Prince Hadrian stepped into the room? And why had he called so many mercenaries to his banner?

The prince himself was tall, dark and handsome. James studied him thoughtfully, noting the fine white outfit, the very traditional turban, and what looked like a certain lack of actual military experience. The sword at his belt wouldn’t be completely for show, James was sure, but it was unlikely the prince had ever been in a real fight. James had been trained in swordplay, naturally, yet there were limits to what a swordsman could learn from his teacher. He’d come very close to being killed, the first few times he’d fought someone who genuinely wanted to kill him. It could easily have been the end of him.

“Pretty,” Tancella muttered.

James elbowed her. “You know better.”

Prince Hadrian walked to the front of the room, stood in front of a curtain and turned to face them. “Thank you for coming,” he said, in a rich confident voice that suggested he’d had excellent tutors rather than learning how to project confidence naturally. “Please, sit. We have much to discuss.”

He pulled the curtain aside, revealing a map of the Inner Sea and surrounding countries. “The time has come to retake Kentigern.”

There was a long pause. James leaned forward, studying the map as the silence grew and lengthened. Kentigern had been sparsely populated – he reminded himself that the map was nearly fifteen years out of date – and there were only four major cities within her borders: two resting on the coast, one nearly a hundred miles inland and a final city in the southern mountains that had been the kingdom’s only true line of defence. The remainder of the landscape had been rough, unable to support more than small settlements even before the necromancer had crushed the kingdom’s defences and taken over. Now … James had seen the Blighted Lands. They were a poisoned hellscrape, barely able to support life. He doubted Kentigern would be any better.

“My family and my people have always yearned to return,” Prince Hadrian continued. If he was aware of the doubt pervading the room, he didn’t show it. “And now, finally, we can do it. We have the power to storm the kingdom, defeat the necromancer and retake the lands that were once ours and will be ours again. We will commit everything we have to this venture. We will not fail.”

“You’re forgetting the elephant in the room, Your Highness,” Captain-General Champion said, coolly. Only a person who knew him very well would pick up the sarcasm in his tone. “There is a necromancer in Kentigern. The only person who has ever defeated a necromancer in single combat is Lady Emily and I don’t see her amongst us. Do you have a plan? Or do you intend to defeat him with your good looks?”

The prince flushed, his skin darkening. “Lady Emily has not replied to my summons,” he said, as if a prince in exile, with little real power, could summon the single most famous person in the Allied Lands. “However, we do have her necromancer-killing weapon. We can defeat the necromancer quickly, without a long drawn out fight.”

A rustle ran around the room. James kept his thoughts to himself. There were so many stories about Lady Emily that it was hard to know which ones were actually true and personally he suspected she was somewhat overrated. A person that powerful should be empress of the entire world by now. Most sorceresses craved more and more power and yet Lady Emily seemed reluctant to pick up the power she had, let alone reach for more. It suggested she might be bluffing, in a manner that would be very dangerous if someone called her bluff …

And yet, James knew necromancers had been killed through magitech. He didn’t pretend to understand it – that was Tancella’s job – but he knew Lady Emily was hardly the only living person to kill a necromancer. He supposed that explained Prince Hadrian’s sudden haste to gather troops to recover his homeland. If someone else got there first, it would be very difficult to get them out again.

They’d have plenty of time to loot too, James mused. Kentigern hadn’t been a rich kingdom, not by the standards of Alluvia or Zangaria, but any kingdom was wealthy on a purely human scale and it was unlikely the exiles had managed to get everything out before the necromancer drove them out. If they have the wealth of a kingdom, they can hire mercenaries themselves …

“The plan is very simple,” Prince Hadrian said, in a tone that suggested their agreement to be a foregone conclusion. “We will land at Neptune’s Gate” – he pointed to one of the coastal cities on the map – “and challenge the necromancer to combat, luring him into the open so he can be killed. Afterwards, we’ll wipe out the remaining orcs and take possession of the rest of the kingdom, at which point we can start transporting the exiles back home.”

“To a land that will have changed beyond all recognition,” Tancella muttered. “How many will want to go home?”

James couldn’t disagree. Most refugees from the Blighted Lands had been scattered and then integrated into their host countries, often by force. The ones who had refused had been enslaved or simply exiled. If the Kentigerns had managed to keep themselves together … it was a recipe for trouble, as they had children and started to think of their host kingdom as their home without quite blending into the native population. He was surprised Tidebank had allowed it, not when it was likely going to cause problems in the future. It was something he’d have to investigate after the briefing. The odds were good it would bite him and his men as well as their paymasters.

“We have gathered the immense financial resources of our kingdom in exile,” Prince Hadrian finished. “We can, and we will, offer truly vast payments for your services. If you fight well, we will also offer lands and titles. You will be accepted as part of our nobility and treated accordingly. You will finally have a place to call your own.”

James sucked in his breath. The offer was tempting, in more ways than one. He would like lines and a title, both to show his family that he’d made something of himself and to have a place to rest his weary head. He’d always known it would be difficult, and here Prince Hadrian was offering him everything he’d ever wanted. But he also knew there was a difference between being given a title and being able to make something of it. He could call himself Grand Duke of Neptune’s Gate and style himself master of the surrounding waters, but it wouldn’t mean a thing if he didn’t actually wield power over the territory. Prince Hadrian talked a good game, yet he had no more power than his hosts allowed him and he knew it. James didn’t blame him for wanting to go back home, even if his home was a poisoned wasteland. It was his only hope of making something of himself.

“If you join with us, you will see rewards and know glory everlasting,” Prince Hadrian finished. “And if you choose to leave, you will never see this opportunity come again.”

I imagine not, James agreed, silently. There couldn’t be many kings and princes in exile who had the money to hire such an army and hosts willing to let them do it, even if it was an ill-disguised attempt to get rid of him. Tidebank stood to gain no matter the outcome. If you fail, no one else will be willing to take the chance.

A mercenary he didn’t recognise leaned forward. “How can you be sure there’s only one necromancer?”

“They tend to fight like cats and dogs,” Prince Hadrian pointed out. “If there was more than one, they would have fought it out by now. And besides, we could kill two as easily as one.”

Hah, James thought.

“And how can you be sure the orcs will scatter?” The mercenary wasn’t letting it go. “And how can you be certain the necromancer will engage us?”

“The necromancer will see an army of human sacrifices,” the prince said, waspishly. “Of course he won’t want the orcs to butcher us all.”

James had to admit it was a decent point, if risky. A necromancer couldn’t draw life force and magic from a corpse and orcs were too dumb to take prisoners if they weren’t properly supervised. The necromancers were insane, and it was often difficult to predict what they’d do if faced with an unexpected challenge, but they tended to be desperate for more sacrifices and willing to do whatever it took to get them. There were probably breeding farms on the far side of the ocean, human communities raising children to feed their master’s endless lust for power … he shuddered in disgust. His family had never done anything so vile. But the necromancers cared nothing for human decency.

He frowned as he studied the map. On paper, the plan was workable. In practice, there was just no way to be sure. Fifteen years of necromantic occupation would have reshaped Kentigern in a hundred different ways, from cities being allowed to crumble into dust to pools of tainted magic poisoning the land. The roads and bridges might well be gone, unless the necromancer had seen fit to maintain them, and the network of wells would quite probably be poisoned. There was no way to know, either, if they could live off the land. Kentigern had been a rough landscape before the invasion and now … he suspected most farms had been eradicated long ago.

“If the orcs crumble as you suggest, it should be easy,” he said, out loud. “If.”

Prince Hadrian eyed him. “If the necromancer is killed, the orcs will no longer have a master and start fighting amongst themselves.”

James nodded, slowly. He’d seen it before in his long career, orcs turning on each other – heedless of the human soldiers marching towards them – as soon as their master died. Orcs followed the strongest, without question, and if there was no clear winner they’d fight it out until someone emerged … if they didn’t fragment into a number of smaller bands and scatter across the landscape. It took a necromancer to control an entire army of orcs and it was rare, almost unknown, for anyone else to manage it.

If only because no one wants a tribe of orcs right next to them, he reminded himself, dryly. Who would?

He listened, carefully, as the prince fielded more and more questions. The prince wasn’t stupid, James decided, but he was inexperienced and hot-blooded enough to have problems listening to people who had actually gone to war. James had met quite a few aristocrats who had the same problem, yet none of them had been raised as a prince in exile, a prince who couldn’t bear the thought of being a powerless refugee for the rest of his life. He suspected the prince’s father – he had to be alive, or the prince would have crowned himself – had agreed to the plan for more than one reason. His son had to be doing something for the sake of his mental health.

Which doesn’t mean this is the right thing to do, he mused. The whole operation could go horribly wrong.

He studied the map thoughtfully. The basic concept was simple enough. It should be easy to seize the coastal city, bring in more supplies, and wait for the necromancer. There would be no pressing need to march onwards immediately, once the necromancer was killed … they could pause long enough to scout the landscape before advancing into enemy territory. The orcs would have plenty of time to thin their numbers before the invaders arrived. And yet … if they were caught at Neptune’s Gate and pinned against the ocean, they’d be captured and sacrificed. The living would envy the dead.

Prince Hadrian stepped backwards, clasping his hands behind his back. “I hope you will join us in this grand endeavour,” he said. “We have the men, the money, and the will to reclaim our homeland. Those of you who take part will be rewarded and remembered in song and story, those who don’t will be forgotten, cursed to bow their heads while others boast of their role in liberating a kingdom from the necromancers. You have two days to decide. Glory everlasting or a shameful retreat?”

He turned and left the room. His staff started handing out papers. James took his and glanced at it automatically, noting an outline of the operational plan. There was no secrecy now … not, he supposed, that it mattered. No one would betray their plans to a necromancer, not now the war was over, and the various mercenary leaders would have to make their case to the rest of their officers and enlisted men. James wondered what his officers would make of it. The plan offered huge rewards, if they won, but the risk was dangerously high.

Tancella met his eyes. “A handsome man, but inexperienced,” she said. “What do you think?”

“I need to discuss it before I make any final commitments,” James said. He was tempted to discuss it with the rest of the leaders first, but his officers would see it as a betrayal. “Let’s go.”

He led the way out of the mansion, looking around with more interest now he knew who was really living there. The whole place was designed to make it clear the prince and his family wouldn’t be living there forever, even if they’d already stayed for over a decade. He supposed it explained the prince’s desperation. It wasn’t good for someone to live on the charity of others, not if they were an able-bodied and hearty young man. The prince’s mental state would be a very real concern for his minders.

And at least he’s trying to do something, James conceded, as they made their way back to the camp. He couldn’t imagine his brother taking such a gamble. It speaks well of him. I suppose.

 

Chapter Seven

“And what are you looking at?”

James flinched, suddenly very aware that Gruber was right behind him. He’d been supposed to be standing watch, in the middle of the camp, and to be distracted … Khan had told him some horror stories about sentries who allowed themselves to be distracted, or fall asleep while they were meant to be standing guard, and none ended very well for the poor men. If he was about to be flogged to within an inch of his life …

“That, sir,” he managed. The airship hovering over the city was so alien to him that he had real difficulty looking at it. “I just couldn’t keep my eyes off it.”

“I see,” Gruber said. “You can do five hundred push-ups after we have our brief ceremony.”

He whistled, loudly. The rest of the platoon hurried out of the tent, looking as if they’d been caught doing something they really shouldn’t. James hoped to hell they hadn’t … he’d already learnt that the officers believed in collective punishment, for men who should have called their comrades out for shitty behaviour and yet hadn’t opened their mouths. It was difficult to tell where the line between reporting and snitching was actually drawn and he was silently relieved that, as a new recruit, he wasn’t obliged to try to figure out where the line was while being badgered to keep his mouth firmly shut. What was the point where you could report someone without the rest of the platoon deciding you couldn’t be trusted? He didn’t know.

“Our dear maggot, first-rank, has mastered enough to move up the ladder,” Gruber said, shortly. “Robin, you are hereby promoted to maggot second-rank. You may now thank me.”

“Thank you, sir,” Robin managed.

He wasn’t sure he deserved it. A week of training and endless drilling, practicing everything from rote marches to loading his rifle while staying under cover, didn’t make him a soldier. Did it? He hadn’t faced anything more dangerous than a handful of lessons in swordplay, which had left him battered and bruised even though they’d been using wooden blades; he suspected none of his opponents had really meant to harm him, merely to remind him he could be harmed. The lesson had sunk in very quickly …

And yet he knew he had much more to learn.

“As a special treat, you may visit the watering hole,” Gruber continued. “Your hard work has earned the platoon a reward chit. But you’d better be sober at reveille tomorrow.”

Khan muttered something, too low for Robin to make out. Gruber clearly did.

“You can join Robin in his five hundred push-ups,” he said. “And don’t cheek me like that again.”

“Yes, sir,” Khan muttered.

“Dismissed,” Gruber said. “Have fun, but remember to report back before last call.”

Robin nodded, then dropped to the ground to begin his push-ups. Gruber and the sergeant kept a close eye on the enlisted men and they’d notice if he didn’t follow orders. Khan dropped down beside him, carrying out his own with infuriating ease. Robin wasn’t sure how long Khan had been with the company, but he’d certainly been part of it long enough to be used to performing hundreds upon hundreds of push-ups. Robin had never carried out so many in his life as he’d done over the last week and yet his body still ached, endlessly, with every punishing session. He knew he was getting stronger, that the punishment served more than one purpose, but it still grated on him.

He staggered to his feet when done and looked at the darkening sky. “I need my bed.”

“Wimp.” Khan slapped him on the bad. “We have drinking to do.”

He stuck his head inside the tent and whistled. Robin groaned inwardly. He’d never been that fond of drinking, not after watching the older men drink themselves senseless during the winter hours and stumble home to take it out on their wives and children. His father had been one of the better ones and he’d beaten his wife a few times … Robin felt sick just remembering it. The women hadn’t been entirely defenceless either, he reminded himself. One drunken woman had smashed a jug on her husband’s head, so hard he’d never been quite the same since. And if they got drunk here …

“Just Mason and I, it seems,” Khan said. Mason was a younger man who claimed to have been with the company from childhood. No one had called him out for lying, so Robin suspected it was actually true. “Come on.”

He winked. “He didn’t say which watering hole, did he?”

Robin blinked. “Where do you want to go?”

Khan jerked a finger towards the growing tent city. “I think we can find somewhere there …”

“I …” Robin caught himself. They weren’t precisely disobeying orders, were they? He was torn between telling them not to be stupid, even calling Gruber to report them, and sticking with his mates. There’d been one boy back home who’d ratted out his friends and been a pariah ever since. Bad enough in the village, but far worse if he depended on his friends and comrades to watch his back. “Just be careful, all right?”

“Have I ever not been careful?” Khan grinned at him. “Don’t worry, you’ll be fine.”

He led the way out of the camp – Robin couldn’t help wincing at the non-existent stockade – and into the maze of tents, some so large they were practically houses and others so small there was barely room for one person. There was little order, as far as he could tell; there were tents from one mercenary band jammed up against tents from another in a manner he couldn’t help finding confusing. There were a number of men sleeping on the ground – he froze, just for a second, as he saw one man kneeling in front of another and taking his manhood in his mouth – and others drinking heavily, tossing back the alcohol as through it were water. He blushed, helplessly, as he saw a woman bent over a barrel, her skirt raised to reveal her arse and a line of men waiting their turn to … he didn’t want to think about it. He wasn’t ignorant. He knew how babies were made. But …

Khan elbowed him. “Don’t worry,” he said. “You’ll get your turn soon enough.”

Robin shook his head, trying not to see anything else as the two led him towards a large half-open tent. The racket of men drinking and singing grew louder, the mercenaries bellowing out the words to several different songs as they drank; a handful were dancing with surprising vigour or sleeping off the alcohol at the edge of the tent. Robin took a sniff and wished he hadn’t. There was more alcohol in the air than he recalled from back home and that was worrying …

“Keep your head down, if the glasses start flying,” Mason advised. He didn’t sound particularly worried. “Shouldn’t be too long before someone throws the first punch.”

Robin muttered a curse as they guided him to a makeshift table. There really was something nasty in the air, something that gnawed at him even as a waitress arrived to take their order. She was young and pretty, wearing a dress that caught his eye and drew it to her chest … he flushed again, helplessly, as Khan ordered three large beers. Robin told himself, firmly, that he would only drink one. There was no way to be sure how much alcohol was in the brew. Hell, he wasn’t sure it was safe to drink.

“You liked her?” Khan winked, broadly. “Nice chest, right?”

Robin said nothing as the waitress returned with three glasses of beer. Mason made a big show of sniffing it, loudly asking what the hell they’d done to the poor horse before putting it to his mouth and taking a swig. Robin sipped his and grimaced at the taste. Perhaps he needed to get drunk quickly enough to get used to the taste, or perhaps … he shook his head firmly as the singing grew louder. The words were either blurred or obscene. He didn’t know and he didn’t care. Khan kept chattering beside him, encouraging him to drink up … Robin took advantage of a sudden outburst of fighting on the far side of the tent to pour half his glass into the gutter. It really wasn’t very good beer.

The night wore on, the mercenaries coming and going … or being carried out, dead drunk, by their comrades. Robin drank as little as he could, unwilling to risk being drunk in such a place. Khan stood and left for a few moments, probably looking for somewhere to piss, while Mason sang loudly … Robin was certain he was on the verge of drunkenness, if he hadn’t already crossed the line. Gruber was going to be pissed tomorrow … Robin tried to calculate how many push-ups they’d have to do and drew a blank. Gruber would probably have to make up some new numbers to ensure they were punished properly. Bastard.

Khan returned, grinning from ear to ear. “Come with me,” he said. He’d drunk at least three glasses of beer and yet his voice sounded surprisingly normal. “I've got a real surprise for you.”

Robin eyed him, then stood. Anywhere was better than the tent. Mason waved them off and then ordered more beer … Robin wondered if they should be leaving him alone, but figured Khan and Mason knew what they were doing. Probably. The racket died away as they left the tent and headed through a maze of smaller tent, some so badly tattered that they wouldn’t provide any protection if it started to rain. He glanced up, noting the stars overhead. The tents were relatively safe, for the moment.

“In here,” Khan said. “Have fun.”

He stepped aside to allow Robin to enter the tent, closing the flap behind him. The only source of light was a dim lantern, providing just enough illumination for Robin to see a camp bed … and a woman lying on it, as naked as the day she was born. It took him a second to realise she was the waitress, the same woman he’d admired earlier … his eyes were caught, helplessly, by the shape of her breasts and the neat patch of dark hair between her legs, hiding her womanhood. His manhood was suddenly hard, almost painfully hard. It was the first time he’d seen a wholly naked woman in his entire life.

The waitress smiled at him, shifting to draw his eyes back to her breasts. “Well? Are you coming?”

Robin swallowed, hard. In theory, he wasn’t supposed to have sex before marriage. In practice, he knew there were boys and girls in the village who had gone all the way … some getting away with it and others having to have a very embarrassing conversation with their parents after discovering that yes, they could get pregnant on their very first time. He recalled burning with envy after hearing his best friend had tumbled a girl they’d both wanted, that she’d done things with him that Robin wanted her to do with him. To him. The urge to step forward and just take her was almost overwhelming. He didn’t have to be a virgin. He could …

The waitress shifted, again. “Would you rather me on top? Or would you rather …”

She rolled onto her back, then lifted her legs to invite him to enter from behind. Robin couldn’t move. He wanted her and yet … his eyes traced the shape of her buttocks, the scarred legs and the patch of hair … he could see her womanhood and her anus, a place he knew a girl could be taken if she really didn’t want to risk pregnancy. A friend had bragged about it, although Robin didn’t believe it. He hadn’t wanted to.

The waitress turned again. “Would you rather a boy? I could call one …”

Robin didn’t trust himself to speak. Instead, he turned and stumbled out of the tent. The night air was cool and the stench was almost welcome, after what he’d seen. The waitress had been pretty and her naked body was the finest he’d ever seen, but how many men had shared her charms? He hadn’t courted her, he hadn’t met her one harvest dance where complete strangers sometimes kissed and more; Khan had paid for her services. She was a whore and …

His heart twisted, torn between the urge to go back into the tent and take her like a dog and a desperate desire to flee. It was difficult to think straight. The idea of putting it in a girl he didn’t know at all was wrong, but so was the thought of not taking her. It was a horrible mess and he didn’t know what to do. He wanted her and he was repulsed by her and ... shit.

“That was quick,” Khan said. “You had a good time?”

Robin glowered at him. “You could have told me what you were planning!”

“I thought you deserved some reward,” Khan said. “Was she good? Have you buttered her bun for me?”

“No!” Robin hadn’t meant to shout, but … “I didn’t!”

Khan cocked his head. “You don’t mean that, do you?”

He sounded more curious than angry. It didn’t help. Robin found it hard to talk normally. “I didn’t sleep with her.”

“I didn’t hire her to sleep with you,” Khan said. “I wanted her to fuck you. Or get fucked.”

Robin flushed. “It wasn't what I wanted.”

Khan shrugged. “And what do you want? A boy?”

“No,” Robin said. “I …”

“A nice young merchant’s daughter? A farmer’s daughter? A noblewoman?” Khan laughed humourlessly. “Do you think you can marry a nice virgin, or even a respectable young widow in need of a father for her children? You were marked the moment you joined us, marked as a mercenary … an enemy of all. The majority of nice young women would sooner become whores than marry us. If you want a wife and children … this isn’t where you want to be.”

He shrugged. “There is no future for us, Robin. We will fight and march and fight again until we die or get crippled or wind up too old to fight any more. The Old Man is better than most about encouraging us to save, but no amount of money will make up for being a mercenary. Your hopes of a normal life, as a farmer or a merchant or even a serf, are dead. They died when you took the oath.”

Robin gritted his teeth. “That isn’t true.”

“We fight for money,” Khan pointed out. His voice became singsong. “No one likes us. Everyone hates us. They think we should go and eat worms. Don’t think they will draw a line between the Battling Bastards and everyone else” – he waved a hand at the other tents – “when they have so many examples of mercenaries who prey on the civilians who get caught in the middle. Your life is here now, unless you run away. And even if you do …”

He shrugged, expressively. “Go back into the tent and fuck her. Fuck her hole, fuck her mouth, fuck her ass … why not? Be soft and caring or hard and brutal, whatever you like. You have nothing to lose. You may as well enjoy her while it lasts.”

“I can’t,” Robin managed. “She’s …”

“She’s a woman who sells her body for money,” Khan said, flatly. “Or do you think fucking her or not will make any difference to her life? She will be dead in a year or two, worn out and sold or murdered by a client who goes too far. Your pity will mean nothing to her. There’s nothing you can do to help her, and why would you even try?”

He lowered his voice. “This is your life now, Robin. You may as well enjoy it while it lasts.”

“I can’t,” Robin repeated. The idea of bedding a woman who didn’t want him was appalling. Except there was a part of him that did want to go back into the tent, that did want to take her … a part of him that echoed Khan’s words, offering excuses for doing something he knew to be wrong. He could have taken the first and only girl he’d kissed, because he was stronger than her, but that would be rape. What was the difference between raping a woman by force and paying a woman who had no other options? “I’m sorry, but I just can’t.”

“Sucks to be you, I guess,” Khan said. “Go back to the tent. I’m going to get laid.”

Robin scowled. “What about Mason?”

“He’ll be fine, good at drinking without getting blind drunk that one,” Khan said. “See you tomorrow. Don’t get caught sneaking back into the tent.”

He stepped past Robin and into the tent. Robin hesitated, torn between the urge to stop him and a desperate desire to be somewhere, anywhere, else. Had it been a mistake to bring himself and Eliza here? Or had it been the best of a set of bad choices? He hadn’t realised they’d sold their souls …

There was nowhere else to go, he told himself. We had no choice.

It wasn’t a very satisfactory thought, he mused, as he started to pick his way through the maze of tents. The night was darker now, the harsh edge in the air growing sharper … behind him, he heard the sound of a fight. He glanced back once, satisfying himself the fight was nowhere near the drinking tent, and walked onwards. Khan would be safe, he was sure, and as long as he got back to the tent before it was too late his absence would probably go unnoticed. And …

He shook his head. He didn’t want to think about it.

 

Hi, everyone


Unfortunately, next week is a two-day holiday for my kids school, and we have to be there on Thursday, so the next update should come Wednesday 17th. I hope you enjoy the story so far and remember, all comments are welcome.


Chris