Chapter Four

Adryngar was in a cell. He wasn’t sure where. One of Kyrbat’s bodyguards had gotten in a solid whack on his head, which Adryngar regarded as a personal failure, and everything was a blur after that.

Regardless of where it was, the cell wasn’t particularly unpleasant. There were a couple of horse hides in the corner that he had slept on, and the bucket was empty, thank the Emperor. There were no windows. Torchlight came through the bars of the cell door. Someone had removed the knives from his boots.

He was awake when two soldiers came to get him. They were regular infantry. Adryngar wasn’t sure what to make of that. Did they think he wasn’t dangerous enough to merit a better guard, or did they think that attacking Kyrbat had been an isolated incident? The soldiers didn’t speak. One of them unlocked the cell door and let him out while the other kept a spear leveled at him. Adryngar asked what time it was, but they didn’t respond.

They escorted him through red sandstone passages. They climbed more stairs than Adryngar cared to count. When they finally emerged, it was into a massive, high-ceilinged room that Adryngar recognized as one of the imperial audience chambers. He had been in the dungeons below the imperial palace, and judging by the sunlight streaming through the room’s large windows, he had spent the night there.

The Imperial Regent was seated on the throne at the far end of the room. She gestured to the soldiers, who slipped back through the door and closed it behind them, leaving seamless wall.

“Approach.”

Adryngar walked up the long black and red carpet to the throne, stopping a respectful distance away and bowing.

The Regent was leaning against the back of her throne, a hand on her forehead. “I have been following your career since you were nineteen. You have proven yourself an exemplary tactician and a prudent man. You have conquered some of the greatest threats to the Empire of our time.” She leaned forward. “But I don’t think I need to list your military accomplishments to establish the depth of my surprise that you would do something so monumentally stupid.”

Adryngar had expected this. He didn’t mind the Regent being angry at him. He was waiting to hear how he would be executed, for that was surely what the Lord Mayor had demanded. No general was worth a high-ranking noble, especially not a slave general. He hoped it wasn’t anything particularly embarrassing, but knowing Kyrbat, he was sure it was.

“My position as Regent is precarious. Our society is still deeply reluctant to put women in positions of power, and my opponents are already fighting to turn the situation to their advantage. I was the one who fast-tracked your career, and if it blows up in my face entirely I stand to lose the regency, at the very least.” The Regent leaned back again. “I convinced Kyrbat to be content with an indirect execution. You will receive another military assignment.”

Adryngar looked up in surprise. He had never heard of anything like this happening before. Assault on a noble by a peasant invariably resulted in immediate execution.

“I have been overseeing the construction of a number of ships. The first fleet of the Vloss Empire. You might be curious why I decided we need one, considering we’ve existed for over three thousand years running campaigns on land. I received intelligence from spies about a continent to the east, across the sea.”

“There’s nothing to the east,” Adryngar said irritably. “Ships that go that way never return.” Oh.

“But one has returned,” the Regent said. “The Shoalcutter. She brings word of a rich land, full of water, peopled by barbarian humans, and she brings information on how to get there. That is your assignment. Follow the maps the spies have drawn up, find this place, and take it for Vloss.”

She was apparently waiting for him to respond, so Adryngar did. “And Kyrbat won’t demand my death upon my return?”

“Should you return, no. Given that conquering a place as vast as this and holding it is almost certainly impossible, Kyrbat will acknowledge your worth if you succeed.”

“How large is this place?” Adryngar asked.

“We are uncertain. But the reports have been more than enough to convince me that this is indeed a death sentence for you, especially considering the limited resources the ships will afford you.”

“If it’s a death sentence for me, it’s a death sentence for the rest of my army,” Adryngar said sharply. “You can’t mean to waste thousands of men to execute me.”

“I certainly do. And don’t be so full of yourself. It’s not just to execute you. I act in self-preservation. You must realize how fragile our system is.”

He looked at her blankly.

She sighed. “The only reason that the nobility remain in control is that we convince the peasants that they are incapable of rising up against us. We have maintained that as truth for three thousand years. Were the lower classes to revolt, the Empire would fall.”

She saw his look of surprise. “Oh, we would have the battlemages, of course. And a few noble officers might convince their command to fight for us. With them supporting us, along with the private armies that some of us choose to maintain, we would put up a substantial fight. But in the end we would collapse, especially if the military proper chose to remain neutral or even fight for the peasants. If I were to outright execute you, it would make it appear that I viewed you as a threat, which could inspire peasants to rise up. If I were to let you go with minimal consequences, the regency would appear weak, which again could inspire a revolt. But by sending you on campaign, I not only make it clear that I am not afraid of you, but that you are replaceable and I am still completely in control of your actions. It cements my position as Regent, it stops peasants from getting ideas, and it gets Kyrbat off my back as an added bonus. I am quite pleased with the solution.”

Adryngar was quiet. He couldn’t say that he hadn’t considered it before, but hearing the Regent say it drove the point home. The nobility wasn’t as powerful as it was made out to be. Not that it mattered; fear of nobles was so deeply ingrained in slaves and peasants that it would be almost impossible to convince them otherwise. As for the Regent’s solution, it infuriated him. He had dedicated his life to saving as many soldiers as possible, and here she was, throwing away tens of thousands of people to keep the nobility in charge.

Of course, it wasn’t as if he had a choice. He would get on a ship, one way or another. He could be killed as soon as they were out of sight of land, but the army would go on campaign anyway to keep the illusion going, and the end result would be the same. The best thing to do would be to comply. Then he could be sure the army would be in good hands. He might even have a chance of saving some of them. “I’ll do it.”

“Of course you will,” the Regent said in surprise. “I thought this through carefully. You embark tomorrow morning. In the meantime, the undergenerals are overseeing preparations. If there are personal matters you need to take care of, you may, but only while under guard. Otherwise you will remain in your quarters. Do you have any questions?”

Adryngar had several hundred questions about the nature of the campaign, but he suspected the Regent would direct him to the intelligence officers for most of them, so he stuck to the basics. “What’s this place called?”

“Most of the local populations refer to it as Rune.”

“What’s it like?”

“Cold, apparently. I know few specifics. At present your undergenerals are more informed than either of us, as they are responsible for requisitioning supplies. I will send a spymaster to brief you.”

It sounded like a dismissal, so Adryngar bowed and turned to leave.

“Oh, there is one more thing. Kyrbat has demanded that one of his relatives accompany you as your overseer. The Duchess Gazza Devenkyos. She is providing transport to your quarters. Please refrain from hitting her.”

“Overseer? How much power does she have, exactly?”

“She is closely related to the Emperor. As such, she can override any and all of your decisions. Kyrbat describes her as a competent commander. I rather doubt it, but one can hope.”

“She can’t be that valuable, or Kyrbat wouldn’t send her on a suicide mission.”

“The thought had crossed my mind. Apparently she volunteered. I’ve never heard of her, so I’m afraid I can’t help you guess at her motivations. I trust you’ll make it work.”

The Duchess Gazza Devenkyos was waiting outside the palace in an old-fashioned curhien, rather than in one of the more comfortable modern carriages. Curhiens were two-wheeled rather than four, usually drawn by a team of three horses, one in front of the other two. The Duchess’s horses were blood bay cuhars, which were from the mountains south of the Vloss Desert and were characterized by great strength and relative height. Desirable animals for load-pulling in cities, but ill-suited for anything out on the sand.

A red-liveried slave held open the curhien’s door, allowing Adryngar to climb in. He sat on a red-cushioned seat across from a tall masked woman. A masked duchess? Duchesses, as heirs to Middle Houses or wives of heirs, were expected to have Song proficiency enough to be permanently blinded. Gazza was probably a disgrace to her family.

“Slave,” she said curtly.

Fantastic start. “Duchess Devenkyos. An honor.”

“Don’t flatter. I know my position, and you know yours. I am coming on this campaign in order to establish that I am useful to House Devenkyos and that I have the right to my title. You are going on this campaign in order to die because you assaulted the Lord Mayor of Sulen.”

Adryngar leaned forward. “I don’t intend to die, Duchess.”

“And don’t interrupt. Since I am lacking in most areas appropriate for a noblewoman, I have devoted myself to the art of war. Thus far my efforts have been considered laughable by the rest of Vloss. This campaign will be the end of that. Together our skills should be sufficient to conquer Rune. You will devote the entirety of your time to this task, and perform it to the best of your ability, that we may return to our great country in glory.”

“Again, Duchess, I don’t intend to die.”

“Don’t interrupt. I am a skilled commander, though you are admittedly more experienced. But you will listen to me. I outrank you, slave. My orders override yours. I am descended from some of the greatest military commanders in our history. Do not underestimate me. And do not challenge me. You may offer me advice, given your years of field work, but do not expect me to take it.”

This was getting to be a bit much. “Duchess, I have conducted campaigns as a general for Vloss for seventeen years, and I’ve been in the army for thirty. I have never lost a battle, and I don’t plan on starting now.”

“Good. If you besmirch my name with failure, I assure you I will kill you before the barbarians do.”

Adryngar didn’t have anything to say to that, so they rode the rest of the way back to the officers’ palace in silence, bouncing along uncomfortably on Sulen’s cobbled streets.

Adryngar’s guards turned out to be Drozgol, Vakov, and Ryyk, a quiet Ienian scout chief.

“They asked for volunteers,” Drozgol said with a shrug. “We didn’t exactly have to push anyone out of the way.”

Adryngar proceeded with caution. He wasn’t sure how many people knew that his stupidity had gotten an entire army signed up for a suicide campaign, and if they didn’t know, he wanted to address everyone at the same time. “I’m sorry to cut your leave short.”

“I damn well hope so. I made it to a grand total of two whorehouses before I heard about your run-in with the Lord Mayor. You’ll be covering the cost of my entertainment, by the way.”

“You know I don’t actually get paid more than you, right?”

“I know. You’re still paying.”

“I suppose that’s fair.”

Vakov poured them cold water, and they all took a seat in the various ornately carved chairs in the suite.

“So,” Ryyk said. “Not much chance of coming back.”

Adryngar stopped himself from wincing. “Did the undergenerals tell everyone?”

“No,” Drozgol said. “Only lieutenant and up. We filled in Vakov, though, so you can bet some of the officers have done the same with their friends. I imagine everyone will know by tomorrow.”

Adryngar put a hand to his forehead. “Shit. I wanted to tell everyone at once.”

“My lord could tell them tonight in the barracks,” Vakov said. “Or when we stage for boarding tomorrow.”

“Have to do,” Ryyk said. “I’d do barracks. More personal. Less public.”

Adryngar nodded. He’d known Drozgol since training. He’d met Ryyk shortly after, on his first campaign. Vakov was a much more recent acquaintance, but he was still a friend. They were all his friends, and it was quite possible that they were all going to die because of him. “I’m sorry about this.”

“You can still fix it,” Drozgol said.

“Win it,” Ryyk said, sipping his water.

“Precisely,” Vakov said. “My lord brought us into this situation. My lord must bring us out again.”

“So don’t fuck it up any more than it already is,” Drozgol finished.

“Sage advice,” Adryngar said. After that the conversation turned to preparation—who needed to get their uniform looked over, who needed to requisition a pair of cold-weather boots, who needed new tent poles, whether they could afford for the cavalry to bring any spare horses, what percentage of their supplies should be alcohol, how funny it was going to be to watch inexperienced soldiers experience extended cold for the first time, and other practicalities.

Someone knocked on the door. Adryngar steeled himself—he found spies, with their constant hints that they knew more about you than you did, utterly obnoxious—and opened the door. He blinked. Spies usually blended in. They wore civilian clothes, had unremarkable faces, were average sized. But the man in the door was one of the most imposing figures Adryngar had ever seen. He was nearly as tall as Drozgol and wore robes of black cloth with pieces from a suit of black boiled leather over the top. His steel helm had no eye slits. Adryngar couldn’t tell a thing about what race he was or what he looked like.

“General.” The voice that issued from under the eyeless helm was deep and gravelly. “The Imperial Regent sent me.”

“Come in,” Adryngar said, stepping aside.

The spy stepped in. His helm swiveled around, pointing at each of the soldiers in turn. “You may leave.”

Vakov was the only one who made a move to stand. When the others didn’t move, he quickly turned the movement into a change in position. Drozgol was frowning, and Ryyk was his usual impassive self, golden eyes flicking back and forth between everyone in the room.

The spy flicked one gloved hand up to chest height. A ball of fire appeared there. “You may leave.”

All three soldiers leapt to their feet. Vakov bowed deeply, nearly touching the ground. Drozgol copied him. Even Ryyk clasped his hands to his chest and inclined his head.

Adryngar watched them as they left quickly, Vakov nearly running into Drozgol in an attempt to get out faster. He was in shock. This wasn’t a spy, or at the very least not just a spy. This was a battlemage, and a high-ranking one. Very high. Song use, especially fire, was forbidden in most cities to any but the highest battlemages, and almost all battlemages worked in teams. Even by Sulen’s comparatively low standards, this one had to be one of the Empire’s best operatives. As a general, Adryngar still technically outranked him, but lone battlemages were on a whole other level. They weren’t the kind of people you could order around.

The battlemage took a seat. “You may sit, General.”

Adryngar sat cautiously facing him. “Are you here to brief me?”

“Obviously. I am Djamer, Imperial battlemage and operative to His Imperial Highness the Emperor of Vloss. I have most recently dedicated my time to learning of the continent to the east. As far as you are concerned, I am the authority on the subject. Her Majesty the Regent has instructed me to join you on your campaign.”

Adryngar wanted to ask what the hell Djamer could possibly have done to merit being sent on a suicide mission, but that wasn’t something you could ask a lone battlemage. It was best not to ask them any questions at all.

Djamer reached into his robes, drew out a rolled-up piece of canvas, and spread it out on a small table, facing Adryngar. It was a map of a mountainous land, filled with blank spaces. “This is Rune. We will be landing here.” He pointed to a peninsula jutting out on the west side. “The barbarians call this place Cuisienne. It is largely unfortified state, populated with peasant villages and protected only by poor lords with few warriors. After establishing a base there, we will progress east through the only pass available to us and begin the conquest of Eldden, the most dangerous country of the lot.”

“It’s tiny,” Adryngar said in surprise. “What makes them so dangerous?”

“Wealth,” Djamer said shortly. “They have the funds for solid fortifications and armaments, and their people are for the most part well-off enough to contribute hands to the cause.”

“Why take Cuisienne first? We could land further north in Eldden itself, and our route inland wouldn’t be blocked by mountains.”

“Because Cuisienne will be easy to control. Minimal garrisons will keep the peasants in check. Then we will have a location to fall back to should the inland campaign go poorly. And the only ways in and out of Cuisienne are by sea and through this pass here. The Runers are weak at sea, weaker even than we are. We can defeat them easily should they attempt to strike us there. And we can hold the pass in the mountains, leaving us a large area to regroup and reconsider. Not to mention that Cuisienne can become a reliable source of supplies with the right incentives to the peasants.”

“And you don’t want the possibility of being blocked off from the sea,” Adryngar said. “Did you have any contingency plans in case the pass is taken while we’re on the other side?”

“Don’t let it be taken,” Djamer said shortly. He rolled up the map and handed it to Adryngar. “We can discuss the subject more en route to Rune. Detailed plans will likely be impossible until we actually reach the place. I have a number of spies planted throughout the continent. They should be able to give us information on troop movements and other details. It’s quite cold. Pack your winter gear.”

The battlemage got up and left, leaving Adryngar wondering why the hell he came in the first place if he didn’t want to offer any useful information. He hoped the undergenerals were better informed, or they wouldn’t have any idea what to bring on the journey. Not knowing what you were facing was a horrible way to start a campaign.

And that was more or less how Adryngar had ended up astride his destrier, Bakal, fully armed and armored, in a cold, wet, miserable little seaside village in Cuisienne, as soldiers advanced up the muddy streets—not that they could really be called streets—in the rain.

The bay where the Vloss had anchored their ships was a dark stone gray, its choppy waters nearly matching the sky. Cliffs that seemed on the verge of collapse hugged it loosely, reaching their tallest points on either side of the bay’s mouth. They sloped down to nothing at the furthest inland point of the bay, forming a stony bowl that was utterly devoid of vegetation.

The village sat huddled in the bowl, as if it had been dropped on the edge of the bay and the land had bowed to its weight. Or possibly to the weight of all the boulders that appeared to have been dropped with it. A thin, gravelly beach separated it from the sea. The craggy slopes rose on either side, hulking boulders jutting from the grass that covered their sides but did not deign to relieve the village’s streets or square. Sections of crumbling stone wall protruded from the waves offshore. More than one landing boat had run afoul of submerged rocks.

The houses, which were in many cases little more than glorified tents, consisted of strips of a material that Adryngar had at first taken to be leather, but was too green and textured, woven together and stretched in sheets across stone frames or gaps between boulders. Some had thick, long-haired hides piled on top. The structures crouched together like small wet animals, taking shelter in the rocks.

The village’s most distinctive feature was a single dilapidated stone tower at the top of the north hill, the only building in the village that looked like it wouldn’t be blown over by a strong gust of wind, though it required two great wooden beams that could only be old masts to hold it up. It appeared to be an old watchtower, long since abandoned, devoured by moss, poking out of the grass like a rotting stump. It had a variety of additions made in the same style as the other buildings in the village.

Adryngar nudged Bakal into a trot and made his way out of the village, which was actually a fair size despite its squalor, and up the hill, passing between ranks of soldiers. The villagers were apparently all either holed up inside or out at sea. Perhaps some of them had taken refuge in the tower. Bakal was a little shifty about the rain. They had been on campaign in the rain before, once. The horse would get used to it. Vloss horses were adaptable.

There wasn’t so much as a fence around the tower. Adryngar rode right up to the single rotting wooden door, slid off Bakal, and knocked. I’m here to kill you, let me in, please?

After a moment, the door opened a crack.

“Who’re you?” a child asked from inside.

“General Adryngar of the Vloss Empire. Who rules here?”

“My ma. She’s out, so my da for now. You going to attack us?”

“Only if you refuse to swear fealty to the Empire.”

The door opened a little wider. The child stuck his head out. He was a human, perhaps four or five, dressed in a frayed tunic and furry boots. “He’s up top. You can see him if you leave your swords.”

“You’re not in a position to be making demands,” Adryngar said, amused.

“Ma said I’m not to let anyone in the keep ‘less they leave their swords. She said it’s dangerous.”

“I believe she’d tell you to make an exception in this case. Is there anyone else I can talk to?”

“Well, there’s Lerwor and his family. But they’re fishers. Oh, and Thina. She’s the cook. Ma said I’m supposed to answer the door. And I say you can’t come in ‘less you leave your swords.”

“Well,” Adryngar said. “Allow me to describe the alternative. I kick this door to pieces, walk in, and kill everyone in this tower, starting with you.”

The boy looked at Adryngar for a minute. He looked past the general at the rows and rows of soldiers. Then he looked to the right, toward the sea, and saw more soldiers disembarking from the four docked ships, as well as the dozens of other ships still out in the bay. He pushed the door open.

Adryngar stepped in, ducking under the low doorframe. “Excellent decision.” The lowest room in the tower was occupied by a pile of sacks, a table and chairs, makeshift supports that held up the leaky ceiling, and five people that cowered by the staircase. The boy gestured toward them. “That’s Lerwor and his folk. His arm is broke so he was at home today. He brought his family up here in case you wanted to burn the town.”

“I don’t think it will come to that.” Adryngar followed the boy up the stairs, with Gazza, Djamer, and a unit of infantry behind him. The second floor contained racks and racks of something that smelled of fish but appeared to be some form of plant. The third floor was empty but for a roughly hewn chest of drawers, a small shrine of some kind, and a bed, covered in sealskins, that looked ready to collapse. The rain had formed puddles on the uncovered floor.

The bed’s occupant was a thin old man. A long white beard partially covered robes that had once been fine, but were now falling to pieces. His skin was nearly as gray as Adryngar’s. Very unhealthy, by human standards. The boy ran to the bed. “Da, there’s a scary sort wants to talk to you. He’s got a lot of ships and a lot of people. With funny iveri.”

The man coughed violently and dragged himself to a sitting position. He turned bleared eyes toward Adryngar. “What’s that?”

“I am General Adryngar of the Vloss Empire.”

“Never heard of you. Or your empire. Balatharsas. Of Puddlerock,” wheezed the old man. “It’s my wife you want. Racheris. She’s the Ard of Puddlerock. Off in Eldden to renew her oath.”

“Do you have the authority to swear Puddlerock to me?”

“No. Can’t do it. You’ll have to wait for Racheris to come home. Don’t think she’ll be too pleased with you, though. Don’t hold your breath.”

“We seem to be at odds, then. I require assurance that this town will offer no resistance to my army. I would also like your permission to begin constructing fortifications here. I intend to use Puddlerock as my base of operations for the moment.”

“And if I don’t give my permission?” Balatharsas fell into a coughing fit. Adryngar waited for it to subside before replying.

“Then I’d have to do it without your permission. If you resist, I’d have to use force.”

Balatharsas coughed again. “And why have you come here, then? Sounds like you’ve got a load of soldiers. And you armed to the gills and all.”

“I intend to conquer Rune for the Empire.”

“Ah.” Balatharsas coughed. “Is that so. It sounds like I don’t have much of a choice.”

“You do,” Adryngar said. “You can live peacefully, or you can die. All I require is your oath, and a small portion of your harvest. For the most part, your life and the lives of your villagers will remain unchanged.”

“I can’t promise you the harvest. We owe most of it to Eldden. Fealty, too. Can’t promise you anything, really. But for now, you have my word that none of the town will bother you. Build what you like. We don’t have any warriors. Eldden’s got all of them.”

“Thank you, Balatharsas,” Adryngar said. “Good day.”

Basic camp fortifications on the southern hill, across the bay from the tower, went up quickly. They had a full squadron of battlemages, plus Djamer. Mages could move earth and stone far more quickly than soldiers could, though not as precisely, in most cases. There were no trees here that Adryngar had seen, but three waist-high stakes were part of every soldier’s kit, often carried strapped to the shield. Once the mages raised banks of earth and stone with a ditch on the outside, it was easy enough to fill them with stakes. The camp was built backing the cliff, with a good fifty foot drop down to the sea, so they didn’t need all of them. They constructed a basic gate with the remainder.

It wasn’t the most defensible place, but Adryngar didn’t see that they were likely to meet much resistance yet. He had people keeping a close eye on the village. No riders or any other apparent form of message had gone out. If Puddlerock was the only village that knew of their presence, they had nothing to worry about.

The army had landed in the morning, so they had plenty of time to send out scouts on horseback. As scoutmaster, Ryyk took care of it, leaving Adryngar to talk with Gazza, Djamer, and the undergenerals.

The undergenerals occupied the office immediately below Adryngar. Each commanded a tahlot, making them commanders of small armies in their own right. Generals got to pick their undergenerals, and the tahlot that came with them. Consequently, Adryngar got along well enough with his three. He wouldn’t call them friends, but they were open-minded, intelligent, and highly capable—exactly the qualities Adryngar looked for in officers.

Uskran was a Turok. He was tall and daunting, but he was the quietest and most cautious of the three. He was old, near the end of a long and highly decorated career. He probably viewed this campaign as a fitting end. His soldiers called him the Wall. They said that once Uskran dug into a position, it could not be taken. This was in part due to sheer tenacity, in part to tactics, and in part to an excellent eye for territory. The Wall could find a defensible position in a flat plain, or at least make one.

Tansul was a middle-aged Ienian, and small and slight even for his race. Like Uskran, he had spent much of his career in the scouts, and he brought guerilla tactics to Adryngar’s table. He favored quick, darting attacks, and fast retreats to fortified positions. He also had a wicked and violent sense of humor. Adryngar rather liked him.

Paervorenth was a Rhysian, the rarest kind of Fey of them all. He was the only one that Adryngar had ever met, apart from the one that had been killed at the reception in Sulen. Rhysians were odd. Their eyes seemed to sit too high in their skulls, but it was the horizontal pupils that most disconcerted Adryngar. Paervorenth was a single-minded warrior, harsh, impatient, and impulsive. He could spot an opening and drive his troops into it, but he tended to simply keep going, fight to the heart to the enemy and be unable to withdraw. It was a common trait of young soldiers, and Adryngar doubted Paervorenth was a day over fifty—quite young for a Fey. But the man’s troops respected him. And he could scare the hell out of people, which was nice.

Adryngar took his helmet off and set it on the table. The undergenerals had already removed theirs, Gazza wasn’t wearing one, and Adryngar had yet to see Djamer without his eyeless helm, so he didn’t wait. “What are your impressions?”

“His mind is soft with age,” Gazza said.

“I agree,” Tansul said. “He would be easy to manipulate. I’d bet that we could convince him to swear fealty publicly. His peasants would have to go along.”

“He doesn’t actually appear to be in charge,” Uskran pointed out. “His wife is. Racheris.”

“Right,” Paervorenth said. “She’s the Ard, or whatever it was. I say we wait for her to come back. Then we get her to swear fealty. They don’t have any warriors, what’re they going to do? In the meantime we scout the countryside, figure out what’s what. Maybe they’ve got an actual castle somewhere that we can take and use as our base.”

“Have you considered that he’s trying to deceive us?” Adryngar offered.

“I don’t see how,” Paervorenth said. “If he really does have warriors somewhere, we certainly haven’t seen any sign of them.”

“We also haven’t seen most of his villagers,” Uskran mused.

“They’re fishermen,” Paervorenth said with disgust. “They can’t be much of a threat.”

“You’d be amazed what ordinary people can do,” Tansul said. “We’ve seen some of it, like back on last campaign. Those jungle rebels. They were just farmers and lumberjacks.”

“True,” Paervorenth conceded, “but if this village is any indication, they haven’t got the resources to do anything. They seem to just barely be getting by. And if we go by that family in the tower, they’re undernourished and terrified.”

“That tower’s falling apart,” Uskran said. “I doubt they’ve seen any sort of organized fighting force around here.”

The table was quiet for a moment. Then Djamer said, “I agree with Adryngar. Balatharsas reeked of dishonesty. He is not as insane as he pretends to be.”

Adryngar looked at him in surprise. “Did the Song tell you that?”

Djamer nodded.

“Well then,” Gazza said. “Let’s execute him. Maybe we can use the child as a puppet leader, and as leverage for when the wife gets back.”

“No,” Adryngar said firmly.

“Excuse me?” Gazza said sharply.

“We can’t risk the villagers fighting back. That would set a standard for the rest of the country. If you want to keep people in check, you can’t punish them before they do anything. Then they hate you. No, you wait for them to make a wrong move, and then you punish them. Harshly, as a warning to anyone planning something similar.”

Djamer nodded in approval.

“I hate to leave a threat free,” Uskran said. “Surely there’s some way we can dissuade them without undue force?”

The table was quiet again. Paervorenth looked skeptical. Gazza still looked offended that Adryngar had shot down her idea.

“Leave the supplies unguarded,” Tansul said suddenly.

Paervorenth laughed. “And why would we do that?”

“They haven’t got much food out here. A pile of supplies will be tempting for them. Someone’s bound to try to steal something. And when they do, you strike back, hard. Hang them or burn them or something.”

“That’s a possibility,” Adryngar said. “It’d give us a good chance to show them our fist.”

“I like it,” Paervorenth said. “A little sneaky, but still good.”

“I suggest we have the stockpiles guarded, but arrange for the guard to fall asleep or something similar. Unguarded supplies may seem too suspect,” Uskran said.

“Good point,” Gazza said. “This plan is workable.”

“Good,” Adryngar said. “In the meantime, let’s continue unloading the ships. But not everything. I want at least six ships still fully loaded. If we get word of a decent keep somewhere, I want to be able to get to it quickly, before word of us can spread. And make sure the ships have good soldiers on watch. I’m still not certain the crews the Regent hired won’t try to sail back to civilized parts. And someone send people into the village and to Balatharsas, figure out what’s what. We’ll talk again when the scouts start coming back.”

Scouts began to trickle back into camp in the afternoon. For the most part, they brought reports of rocky plains, richly green with rain, but with no trees, nothing larger than a few windblown shrubs. Tiny villages dotted them, no more than four or five houses surrounded by fields of stunted vegetables. The seaside villages were larger, with dozens of tiny shacks teetering amongst the rocks, their colorless fishing boats bobbing in the gray waters. None were as large as Puddlerock.

Most of these villages did not even have a tower, such as the decrepit structure Puddlerock was graced with. Some had fences or low dry stone walls. Most did not. The most common building material was apparently the greenish leathery substance that the huts in Puddlerock were made of. This turned out to be not the skin of a strange animal, but a type of seaweed called kro that could fulfill a number of functions, ranging from food to clothing to waterproof sheets, depending on how it was prepared. Shacks had stone frames with stretches of heavy kro woven in the gaps.

The people of Cuisienne were exclusively human. Adryngar had known to expect this, but it was still odd to see so many humans apparently living in freedom. They were mostly short, pale, and thin, dressed in shirts of seaweed fibers or wool. There were exceptions in the form of tall men with light brown skin, decorated with tattoos, that came on long, single-masted ships that were painted bright colors.

“The Cuisienne call them Irrissussk,” one scout told Adryngar, having been directed to the general by Ryyk. He stumbled over the unfamiliar word. “They’re traders, live out at sea. They land only to buy and sell goods and fill their water casks. They come from everywhere, go everywhere.”

The scouts all agreed that the people of Cuisienne were surprised and easily frightened by horses. They used pack beasts called iveri, which were apparently mostly out to pasture during this season, and horses were alien to them.

In the early evening, a scout came back on foot. Murmuring followed him. Adryngar was talking to one of the ship captains, but fell silent when he saw the scout.

The scout, a blue-skinned Yadan, was helping his straining horse drag a massive carcass. The body was easily the size of the horse, which was bleeding from four long, parallel gashes in its flank. The Yadan dropped it at Adryngar’s feet and unhooked his horse, which was sweating badly despite the chill. “Scoutmaster Ryyk thought you might be interested, my lord.”

Adryngar examined the corpse, keeping an eye on the horse for signs of chill out of long habit. It was a catlike creature with large paws and thick fur. Its head was streamlined, with considerable ears and a mixture of carnivorous and herbivorous teeth. If horses were predators, Adryngar thought they might have looked something like this.

“Tell me what happened,” he said.

The scout described a herd of these creatures, a herd which had been startled by the sudden appearance of a man on horseback from behind a group of rocks. One had attacked his horse, and he had put his knife through its eye.

“Good work,” Adryngar told him. “Get someone to help you get it over to the cooks. We’ll see if we can make use of these things.”

“So what do you want to do about the ships?” the captain he had been talking to asked.

“I told you, at least six are to remain fully loaded with both supplies and soldiers. If an opportunity arises—if we hear about an actual keep, for instance—I want to be able to act quickly. The horses should all be unloaded, though. They need to move about.”

The captain looked sullen, but went to carry out orders. Adryngar turned and watch the scout and a few other men drag the carcass away. It could only be one of the iveri the scouts had mentioned. Hopefully it wasn’t owned by anyone. He didn’t want to establish a reputation for killing people’s livestock this early on.

Later that evening, Gazza, Djamer, and the undergenerals met him again. Some scouts weren’t due back until the next day, but the ones that had returned had brought uninspiring reports, which Adryngar supposed was a good thing. If Puddlerock was the biggest threat they were going to face in Cuisienne, then Djamer’s plan of using the country as a fallback was a good one. It was too early to judge, really, but so far the reports were making Adryngar feel much better about his situation, and the council ended with everyone more or less happy.

Long years of experience had taught Adryngar that this sort of feeling usually meant that you just didn’t understand exactly what a shitty situation you were in, so he contained his optimism. They had only landed that morning. There was plenty of time yet for things to start going horribly wrong.

He woke up in the middle of the night to a flurry of activity. Oh, shit. He rushed outside to see what was wrong. At first, everything seemed to be normal, except for the number of people running. Then he turned to see what they were running toward.

“Oh, shit!” Three of the ships anchored in the bay were aflame, long columns of smoke boiling into the sky, lit brilliantly by shrieking flames.

As he watched, a great winged beast dove out of the smoke. Adryngar hardly had time to register its existence and improbable speed before it swooped down past one of the burning ships and spewed a roaring tongue of fire at a fourth ship.

What the fuck is that?