Aldric had the Seventh Seal carefully inspect the Anglish installation; the quartermaster was delighted to find the storehouse relatively unmolested and gladly welcomed the crates of foodstuffs and barrels of water, wine, and ale.

“Take everything that isn’t nailed down,” Daveth ordered, and then added, “and the nails, too.”

Aldric gave him the sardonic side-eye. “You want to make an enemy of the Anglish Empire?” He asked, and Daveth shrugged.

“I don’t see them scrambling to stop me.” He offered.

Aldric slapped the giant’s shoulder. “You imbecile. Think. Sooner or later, the Anglish are going to realize their magic crystals aren’t coming on schedule anymore. What do you suppose will happen then?”

Daveth waved away the concern in his captain’s voice. “By then we’ll be long since gone.” He replied indifferently.

Aldric rolled his eyes. “Well, You’re not wrong, but you’re also fucking totally wrong. Sooner or later, they’ll come looking. There will be an investigation, both mundane and magical. They’ll know we were here. There will be retribution.”

Jasin trotted up at that moment to deliver the good news. “Ship in the harbor, sir.” He eyed Daveth meaningfully. “Flying Anglish colors.”

“We’re boned.” Daveth immediately decided.

Aldric gave him a sour expression, but turned to Jasin. “What’re they doing? Are they sending boats ashore?”

Jasin shook his head. “Based on the number of empty boats on shore, I think they already did.”

“...and not an Anglish to be found.” Daveth muttered, glancing around ostentatiously.

“The ship’s just sitting there?” Aldric asked, and Jasin nodded.

“Anchored?” Alldricasked again, and Jasin shrugged in response. “It’s just sitting there.”

Daveth immediately headed for the docks, and Aldric and Jasin had to scramble to keep up with him.

Daveth and Aldric swapped the eyeglass back and forth as they talked.

“Could be empty, like the installation.”

“Nah. They wouldn’t empty the whole ship. Likely the ship’s there to drop off the usual shipment of supplies and pick up the usual shipment of crystals.”

“Then why haven’t they sent anyone over to figure out why the crystals aren’t coming back on the return trip?”

“Awful lot of dinghies tied up here, cap. Could be they did come over, and got themselves caught up in whatever happened here, too.”

“Bit of a reach there, Daveth.”

“Could be we found us a treasure.”

“Don’t be silly. We approach this the wrong way, and they’ll train their guns on us. You ever been in a paddleboat on the receiving end of grapeshot? It isn’t pretty.”

“Look at the number of boats tied up at the dock, cap’n. Look at what’s anchored offshore. We can take the ship.”

“And do what with it, exactly?”

“....well, we’d have ourselves a ship.”

“Do we need a ship?”

“Couldn’t hurt.”

A moment of clarity descended on Aldric. “You know, I just remembered something.”

“What?” Daveth asked.

“I know a particularly stupid merchant dumb enough to buy a ship with no provenance and probably too stupid to sell it before other armed ships bearing a similar shape and function happen to come looking for it.”

“You’re a villain, captain.”

“Well, that’s assuming we can actually steal the bastard.” Aldric replied.

*****

The heist was planned. The rowboats were filled with as many of the Seventh Seal as could be fit, and more besides. They eased out of the docks as the sun went down, and crept towards the merchant ship as quietly as they could. A few silently prayed to dead Gods that the double row of cannon peeking out from both port and starboard were just for show. Grapnels clattered over railings, and mercenaries hoisted themselves aboard.

The upper decks were conspicuously absent. The captain’s cabin was empty; the logbook recorded that he’d sent the usual delivery and retrieval parties, and had not heard back from them in a reasonable amount of time. After a lengthy discussion, they decided to send a third party, with the captain personally leading.

There was a brief scuffle belowdecks; apparently the only person on the ship remaining was the only one unimportant enough to take part in any discussions. Daveth casually bound the ship’s cook in rope, hung a stone about his neck and tossed him overboard before Aldric could stop him.

“Now all we have to do is cut loose the Anglish flag, hoist the Seventh Seal’s banner, and sail it down to Azsig-Noth.” Daveth proudly announced.

“Nope.” Aldric decided.

“What? That’s stupid. That’s not what we planned at all.”

“Yes it is.” Aldric replied. “I just didn’t get around to telling you the rest of the plan.”

“Ass. Tell it, then.” Daveth grumbled.

“Jonan, you’ve sailed a ship this size before. How many you need for a skeleton crew to get it down to Azsig-Noth?”

Jonan perked up. “I recon i could do it with eight.”

Aldric nodded. “Take a full file. Ten people, just to be safe. Meanwhile, we’ll strip the ship of strongboxes, clothes, weapons, food, blankets, supplies, and hopefully those guns aren’t just for show; I’d love to get my hands on their stores of powder and shot. We’ll take that back to shore with us with the rowboats. We will make for the oasis with best possible speed. Jonan, you sell this thing to that merchant I mentioned earlier. Likely he’ll happily indebt himself in with the Azsig-Noth banks again in order to buy such a treasure; likely every ship captain worth his brains will take a look at it and refuse to purchase it. No one is stupid enough to incur the wrath of the entire Anglish navy.” He paused and then added, “And use a proxy for the sale. Don’t want it to get traced back to us. Once it’s done, buy what supplies you feel are necessary, and make for the oasis with the best possible speed. We still have a job to do.”

Aldric glanced around at the file leaders of the Seventh Seal. “What.” He asked flatly. “Questions? Comments? Opinions?”

“You’re a pirate, captain.” Daveth volunteered.

*****

As soon as they made the oasis, complaints of boredom could be heard.

Daveth laughingly ordered them into marching formations and worked them until they complained of exhaustion. Then he had them trot out the archery butts and drilled them. Then came the cavalry drills. Then, in cooperation with Eirawen, they somehow managed to stack three full carts atop a fourth, and drilled them on scaling walls. While he did that, he ordered up the archery and scout files and told them to open fire with arrows that had been blunted with leather and soaked in paint.

“You know why we do this to them, right?” Aldric asked him one day.

Daveth shook his head. It never occurred to him. It just seemed part and parcel of being a soldier. You train and you train and you train, and when you’re not training, you’re fighting, and when you’re not doing either of those, you’re marching, or deploying camps or breaking camps, or any number of chores.

“The whole point of drilling soldiers till they whine about the stupidity of it all is so those soldiers will do the right thing automatically when the terror comes.” Aldric replied.

“I never thought about it like that.” Daveth remarked.

“Well, you’ve never been a commander before, either. But now you are.” Aldric paused, and then added, “You’re doing the right thing in drilling them. Just figured you should understand why.”

Jonan had never told him, or any of the new recruits this. It was simply, “You’re the new guy, time to whip you into shape.”

After the sprints, formations, archery drills, wall climbs, he broke out the dummy weapons and had them raid Aldric’s camp. If they successfully killed more than thirty percent of Aldric’s forces, or kidnapped Aldric himself, they were welcome to celebrate with the barrels of ale and rum they’d liberated earlier.

Aldric’s side rallied quickly; bulling the raid into channels with shield walls and enfilading fire, forcing retreat, time and time again. Daveth and Eirawen took to the field, and strode through the shield walls, casually breaking the wooden pikes into lumber, tossing any soldier that came at them out of the way. A file of archers tried to pin him down; he simply ducked between the lines of their cavalry, forcing them to risk firing on their own troops.

Still, Lynnabel and Alysia repelled Daveth again and again with almost mechanical precision, battering him with their shields to the point where, in frustration and mad with rage, he grabbed the nearest thing he could lay his hands on, and hurled it at them.

The donkey, a bit on the smallish side and weighing in at a paltry eight hundred pounds wasn't expecting to be used as a weapon of war. Certainly the donkey (and the three others of his kind) were accustomed to the theatre of war and the din of battle, and were conditioned to continue lugging wagons and cargo even while under fire- but there certainly was no precedent for Daveth’s furious toss.

The wolf sisters were knocked off their feet by the impact; the donkey kept going, hit the desert hardpan with the crack of breaking bone, cartwheeeled once, came down on its legs in a way that was not intended by nature with another crack of breaking bone, and slid to a stop at Aldric’s feet.

But Daveth wasn’t finished. His frustration was unspent. He charged the two sisters, who were wholly unprepared to deal with his berserker rage. They shouted, they screamed, they declared their surrender, and they likewise sailed through the air.

Aldric barked a command and Eirawen leapt at him. He tried to bat her aside, but she climbed on him, clinging to his back like a spider. She shouted something in a language no one knew, and instantly, Daveth was sheathed in several inches of ice.

Eirawen slid down and off, but the ice cracked, broke, and shattered around Daveth, who slowly came to a stop. Eirawen sidled into Daveth’s blind spot in case she needed to freeze him a second time, but it seemed like it had worked.

Daveth shook his head in confusion, brushing bits of ice out of his hair as he looked around himself.

What had happened? It came back to him quickly- the mock battle. Running his files into Aldric’s camp, getting deflected, defeated, pushed back.

This wouldn’t do. He was supposed to be a Commander, equal in ability but subordinate to the Captain.

So he’d taken the field, used his resources; namely himself and Eirawen, the strange girl with supernatural strength. Things were going fine; his forces were starting to push back against Aldric’s. And then what?

And then he’d snapped. A monk had taken Daveth under his wing, taught him control, taught him focus, but sometimes Daveth couldn’t help his temper. It ran away with him.

“Shit.” He muttered, and looked around himself. A few soldiers had exchanged the blunted mock weapons for real ones; and he was fairly certain Eirawen was going to try and blindside him if he did anything extravagantly stupid.

He raised his hands over his head. “I surrender!” He called out in as loud a voice as he could muster.

“Well that’s good, then.” Aldric remarked dryly. He unsheathed his sword and slashed the throat of the donkey that was weakly screaming at his feet, and stepped over the corpse.

“The cost of your rage this time was a donkey... and maybe the lives of two of my best soldiers.” Aldric advised him contemplatively as he used a swatch of fabric to clean the blood from his sword. “Incidentally, if you’d thrown the donkey just a bit further, it’d’ve killed me, too.” He finished thoughtfully.

“How would you plan to make up for that?” He gestured around them. “You think they’ll follow you after you kill me?”

Daveth let out a breath. “The first thing they’d do is kill me.”

Aldric rolled his eyes. “I should be so lucky to have men so loyal.”

“So what is it? The stocks? A whipping? Latrines?”

Aldric shook his head. “Not this time. You surrendered, which is a crying shame- you were this close to crushing my forces.” He held his fingers an inch or so apart. “Also, you’re an object lesson to the new blood we took in at Tannit: You’re not just a big and strong guy- you’re absolutely fucking terrifying when provoked.” Daveth relaxed, and then Aldric added, “Of course, you do owe me a replacement donkey, and you have to go find Alysia and Lynnabel and apologize to them. Assuming they’re still alive, of course.”

He looked up at the giant. “Tomorrow, my forces will attack yours. You’d damn well better defend a hell of a lot better than you attacked.”

*****

Daveth found Lynnabel in one of the Oasis pools, nursing a broken leg. She gave him a complicated look as he tucked her under his arm.

“I am not luggage.” She warned, but Daveth shook his head.

“I lost my temper.” He explained, and as he waded out of the pool, he sighed. “I don’t much like getting bashed in the face with a shield.”

“I don’t think anyone does.” She replied. It was obvious she was trying for a lighthearted, rueful voice, but it was obvious that whatever trust she’d had in him had faded.

“Aurene said you girls heal up pretty quickly.” He offered and she made a noncommittal noise.

“What?” He asked, but she shook her head.

“Did you see where your sister went?” He asked, but she shook her head again. He called out for someone to help Lynnabel and went searching for Alysia.

After several hours into the night, he finally sat down, his back against the base of a tree. He hadn’t found Alysia.

“I have to admit, it was a shock to be tossed about like a child’s plaything.” A woman called from above. He looked up. High in the branches he spotted Alysia. She was watching him with an intent, focused look.

“I threw you up there?” He gaped.

She shook her head. “I landed much lower. Climbed higher when I saw you coming.”

He made a face. “I’m not going to throw you. Come down. You likely need medical treatment.”

“I’ll be fine by midafternoon.” She called down.

He showed her an irritated face. “Please?”

“Do you regret what you did?” She asked uncertainly.

“I always do.” He replied truthfully. “How bad is it?” He asked after a full minute of silence.

“My collarbone, my arm, three ribs.” She reported. Her voice was strained. “It hurts to talk, so could you please go away?”

“I can’t. I need to see you safely back to camp.” He replied. He was impressed that she’d climbed higher with that many broken bones... and then a little depressed that she’d done so to keep away from him.

“I’m not going anywhere.” She shot back.

“If you can climb up, you can climb down. If you can’t climb down, I’ll catch you when you fall.” He offered.

“Why did you kill the man on the ship?” She called down. “He was a non-combatant.”

“Tenets of war. No quarter given, no lives spared.” He replied a little stiffly.

“Do you regret it?” She asked.

“I’d be stupid to say I did, and foolish to say that I didn’t.” He replied. “There are no self-proclaimed villains. Only legions of virtuous saints.” he added as an afterthought.

“Your captain seems to think honor is important.” She offered.

Daveth ran through the various campaigns he’d been through with Aldric since he was fourteen. Flinging hives of bees down on the beseigers at Avalon’s Gate. The nightmare in the Valley of Rust. Boarding ships in the Bay of Claws to stop smugglers. The massacre at Cathedral Terre in Montesilvano. The sacking of Castle Shadowcatch. The horrors of the Black Plateau of Sarkomand, a place where the Anglish still refused to go, still utterly convinced three hundred years later that it was unsalvageable, and the inevitable purge of the City of Beryl. The Eastern March campaign against Urthan. The Allyen Crusade, where Aldric had been manipulated by some nobleman into a battle for territory. Defending Garen’s Wall.

“He does.” Daveth admitted.

“Do you?” She asked. Her tone indicated that it was an important question for her.

“I don’t run from a fight if I can help it. I hate getting dragged into petty squabbles between nobles. War should be clean, a proper fight between trained fighters. Leading a charge against a rabble of peasants armed with pikes is revolting to me. That’s not war, that’s wholesale slaughter.” he decided.

“For me to heal properly, I will need to sleep.” Alysia called down.

“Right.” He agreed disinterestedly.

After a moment, she added, “I cannot sleep if I cannot climb down. You will need to catch me.” She added reluctantly.

Daveth pushed himself to his feet with a grunt, and carefully helped her down.

As he carried her back to camp, he asked her a question.

“Your order sends out warriors, correct?” He asked. She nodded. “It is. It’s important to us that we keep our fighting skills sharp, so many of our warriors are sent out to various battlefields and mercenary companies.”

“How do you determine who is the most honorable when you fight on opposing sides?” He asked.

Her eyes flicked to his face at this question.

“Pretend the Orgus hired one of your sisters to protect them. When we fought, would you engage your sister?”

“They’re cannibals. I sincerely doubt they would-” Alysia began, but he cut her off. “Don’t do that. You know what I mean.”

She gave him an irritated look. “We would not engage each other unless necessary. If it were necessary, honorable surrender is an option.” She finally admitted.

Daveth chuckled. “I suppose for you such a thing would be possible.” he agreed.

“You disagree?” She asked, curious.

“I think sometimes you have no choice but to fight. To cut and cut and keep cutting, until there’s nothing left.” he offered. She nodded.

“Did you find my sister?” She asked drowsily.

“Yeah. She landed in a pool of water. She’ll be fine after a good rest, like you.”

“Mmm.” She mumbled.

She was asleep when Daveth dropped her off at the tent she shared with her sister. Lynnabel gave him a cool look as he brought her sister in, he gave her a nod and left.

*****

When Jonan returned with his file, a cart, several additional horses, and a donkey that would serve as a suitable replacement, he bemoaned his missed opportunity to participate in the mock battles. Daveth mollified him with a chance to refill his flask from the rum they’d snatched from the ship, and Captain Aldric promised him a chance at a mock battle after they secured the next oasis.

*****

When Alba Jadescale, naming herself Glory the Moringtide, stepped forth from her boat with her armies on the split islands and united the disparate tribes of humans and elves under her banner into what would one day be known as the Yamato thousands of years before the Anglish Empire reached across the Sea of Mirras to Hesperia, another empire flourished thousands of miles away on the continent of Bel-Arib. They had many powers, both mystical and technological, and several cities spanned the continent.

The capital was known as Ankar-Set, and from there they attempted to push back the desert. There were even roads, paved with large chunks of carved stone, that crisscrossed the continent.

But the desert always won. It swallowed the cities one by one, the roads buried under tons of sand and forgotten, leaving dim memories that faded into legend and myth. All that remained of a continent-spanning empire was the city of Azsig-Noth, the Wandering Obelisks, and the occasionally-revealed ruins of the city of Ankar-Set, far to the north. Between Ankar-Set and Azsig-Noth was an arcing curve of seven oases, each of which needed to be scouted, captured, and cleansed of any Orgus threat. Any encampments of Orgus discovered in the desert were to be similarly dealt with.

The first oasis had life; animals slithered, crawled, and lurked in the underbrush. Birds flew and chattered overhead. The second oasis was stripped of all animal life. No birds, rodents, or small animals lurked anywhere. There were only trees, whistling hollowly in the hot desert wind, crowded around a central pool that was so clear you could see all the way to the bottom.

The oasis was roughly the size of a small town, protected on the east side by a massive knuckle of bedrock that blocked the sun in the morning and through most of the day, which made securing it difficult. The Seal resolved to establish a camp on the southern edge, secure it the best they could, and then penetrate the vegetation in ranks to cleanse it of any Orgus.