Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king

The cooing of pigeons filled the canopy, such a soft pulsing that seemed at odds with the tension thick enough to choke the air. From the branches of a hidden rookery, a network of timber and rope woven into the ancient boughs over three patient years, a man emerged. He moved with the quiet grace of a forest cat, cupping a grey-winged messenger in his calloused hands.

Slowly but firmly.

The birds were trained to get used to human’s touch so they did not even move when the hands were on them.

There were dozens of these across the princedom.

Hidden deep within the green cathedrals of the forest, these stations were manned day and night welcoming all the news that they brought. The more time passed the more Alpheo realised his network of agents was a jewel, how else so many small units could communicate so far away from each other?

”Your Grace.” The man knelt, extending the tiny, ink-smudged cylinder he had retreived.

Prince Alpheo took the paper. His fingers were steady, but as his eyes traced the script, a shadow passed over his face.

”Bad news?”

The question came from Edric, who stood leaning against the massive, silver-barked trunk of a sentinel tree. The Legate’s hand rested on the pommel of his sword, his eyes searching the Prince’s expression for a crack. He just like many others were tired. Almost once every three days he led men to attack lone parties of usually, Oizenians.

Him like many other were growing restless with the fact they weren’t doing anything worth mentioning to the enemy.Killing one or two when they ventured ahead was all good and fine, but they were all craving for proper action.

”Troubling, but not bad,” Alpheo responded, his voice like the scrape of a whetstone. He handed the scrap to Edric. ”Bad would be the Bastion falling. This is merely the cost of holding it.”

Edric squinted at the cramped writing.

The well is dark. Only pond remain to drink. Pots of fire ended six days ago. Four towers today. One missed. Three we destroyed their chains. Casualties high for both sides.

The Legate’s jaw tightened. ”This is bad....”

”Troubling,” Alpheo repeated, his brow twitching at the man’s pessimism. ”The Bastion stands. That is the only truth that matters.”

”And the well?” Edric gestured to the parchment. ”What is this ’dark well’?”

Alpheo’s gaze drifted toward the distant, smoky horizon.Edric had not heard the news when they came, so he had no way of knowing what was happening.

”The enemy has grown weary of the direct approach. They have begun to catapult the dead, the rotting, the bloated, and the diseased over the ramparts. Their rations of soap finished long ago, so now there is a feast of rotting from their ranks. They have ample ammunition for that...”

He saw the flicker of revulsion in Edric’s eyes, and then a flash of pure hatred. Alpheo felt it too, a cold coil in his gut, but he had long ago learned to bury his rage beneath a layer of ice.

”The bastards,” Edric spat, his teeth grinding together. ”They boast of chivalry in their missives. They speak of the Warrior’s honor and the blessing of the Weaver. And then they hurl carrion into a man’s drinking water.The cunts.”

”Honor was the first casualty of this war, ” Alpheo said, his voice devoid of pity. ”It’s easy to shout about virtue when the sun is at your back and your belly is full. We see the cloth they are cut from now. It is stained with shit and rot.’’

Edric huffed at that, before horror crossed his features as he just now realised the meaning of that passage. ”Wait...dark well?Does that mean?’’

Alpheo nodded without pleasure ’’One of those carcasses found the mouth of the well. By the time they hauled the meat out, the poison had set in, some had even drank from it and died on the chamber pot. Luckily, they just remained an isolated case, they burnt the body searched the water and stopped a catastrophe in the making. They use it for washing now, after a long boil, but for drinking... they are down to the pond and the rain-barrels.And it hasn’t rained in weeks”

Edric turned on him ”And you say this isn’t bleak? No water, no fire-pots, and a Great Lord crushed by stone? What part of this report gives you heart?”

”The part where they are still writing, I reckon.” Alpheo stepped forward, his presence suddenly looming on the other man.

”They have fought for a month, Edric. For every man we lose on the walls, three of theirs rot in the mud. The countryside is a graveyard of their making, and the ’sweet whores’ we sent into their camp have done their work well.

Tensions ripple through their ranks like a pox, which they are also being plagued by. So many lords and so many grievances with each other.

They have the numbers, yes, but we have the soap and the salt. Inside the walls, they fight the yellow fever and the red pox with discipline. Outside? Outside, they die in their own filth.”

He placed a steadying hand on Edric’s shoulder. ”Asag is there. Of all the men I have ever known, he has the most iron in his blood. If he has not sent word saying the gates are lost, then the gates are held. He will resist until the very stones of the Bastion weep blood.Just as did in Aracina so he will do now.He will fight to the very end, and come back for some more.”

Edric looked at the Prince, his breath shallow. ”I fear the time we need them to resist is longer than the life they have left in them. Iron breaks if you strike it long enough.”

”Then we must make sure it is the hammer that breaks first,” Alpheo replied without a change in tone. His brown eyes looking straight at the Legate’s. Not a hint of doubt could be found in them.

”The informers I have whispered into the League’s ears tell a tale that is pleasing enough for my ears. They are a house of cards held together by the hope of a quick victory. All we need to do is provide the wind. A small push, Edric.’’

The legate looked at his prince as if rabbit ears sprang from his head. He could not believe what he was hearing.

”You still place your faith in that Kakunian madman?” Edric’s voice was a rasp of frustration, his boots pacing a restless circle in the dirt. ”A month has bled away into the soil, and the Mad Bull remains as silent as a tomb. It is time we realize no aid is coming from that quarter. We are alone in this wood.Take heed of that already and think of something else.”

Pessimism, thick and cloying as the mountain mist. Alpheo watched him, his own face a mask of stone. He knew the thought weighed heavily, but he still held trust.

”I say we do as we did at Aracina!” Edric suddenly blurted, his hand white-knuckled on his sword hilt. ”We strike under the shroud of a moonless night. We put the torch to their tents and slaughter the bastards while they dream of their soft wives and wine!”

”We lack the numbers for such a gambit” Alpheo countered, his voice flat and final. ”And the League is no green host we faced at Aracina. They fear the dark now; they keep their fires high and their sentries doubled. They have heard of Shameleik and took counsel from his end.

Besides, our strength is bled thin, scattered across the tall grass and the thickets, gutting their scouts and burning their forage. We would need too much time to see them amassed not to speak about the fact they would no doubt be seen.

We are chipping at their foundation, pebble by pebble. If the air is thin in the Bastion, it is poison in the camps of the League. I will not throw away our remaining iron on a desperate roll of the bones. We hold to the plan.”

”The plan is a slow strangulation,” Edric spat. ”And I fear we are the ones—”

”Your Grace!”

The cry cut through the damp air of the forest. The same man from before emerged from the shadows of the rookery tree, but his face had gone the color of curdled milk. In his hand, he held a second cylinder.

More bad news. No doubt.

White wings for dark words.

Alpheo went to the message before the man could even kneel.He felt a pang of something deep in his guts.

He knew it could not be from the Bastion, they had just received the message now.

With steady fingers that belied the thundering in his chest, Alpheo opened the cilinder and unfurled the parchment. His eyes moved rapidly across the lines, and for a heartbeat, the only sound in the forest was the distant, mocking call of a jay.

He let the paper flutter in his grip, his gaze turning toward the southern horizon, past the smoke of the Bastion, toward the rich, dark veins of his land.

”Alpheo?” Edric’s voice was hushed, the fire of his previous anger extinguished by a sudden, cold dread. ”What is it? Is it Asag? Is he well?”

”No,” Alpheo whispered, the word tasting like ash. ”It is not word from the Bastion.”

He turned the parchment so Edric could read too.

”The Prince of Sharjaan has shown his true face,” Alpheo said, his voice dropping into a tired note ”He has spat upon our covenant of bread and salt. Shaza has laid siege to Malshut Castle. Four thousand Sharjaan spears sit at our south. We have been betrayed.”

A long silence enshrouded the forest.

’’What are we to do then?’’ Edric finally asked, finding the quiet intolerable.

Alpheo looked at him with a gaze filled with pity. What they were to do? What could they do?

The answer was as unpleasing for the prince as it was for the legate.

’’Nothing.’’