Keeptown – Homecoming
Through millennia and uncountable generations, the Six Sisters have watched over the wellbeing of the citizens of the Grove Protectorate and the many nations which have claimed ownership of them before, standing as bastions of hope and safety in a world beset by evils both domestic and foreign, ordinary and supernatural.
Among them, the grand Citadel of Avium is widely believed to be the first of [parchment moth damaged] superstructures within the Grove and has served as the official seat of many of the greatest imperial powers in the history of the continent of Lastion. While not as obscenely profitable as the vast trading hub of Alba, nor as bountiful as their sister-city Oxycarpa, Avium is a wonder of beauty within the nation and the known world.
Today, it sits as the capital and primary seat of power of the Grove Protectorate and her territories, housing the center of all governmental functions within the House of Lords and the gatekeep garrisons of the Protectorate armies nestled within its towering, roseate walls.
-A History of the Grove 7th Edition
Maester Sophiorni of the Twelfth Tower of Avium
Intricate silver-white veins wound across Avium’s pink marble walls, radiating the orange light of afternoon, a watermelon-pastel glow against the Grey Sea. It all but gleamed against the foreground of flowing grass plains and drying sunflower stalks, and Fourth Squad couldn’t help but be awed by the massive structure, amazed as always by the spectacle of it even from their position some miles to the northeast. The great interlocking walls gave the impression of tightly curled petals, appearing a thing cradling the high cliffs over the Grey Sea and forgotten by some cosmic entity or God inconceivably long ago.
The seeming emptiness of the great expanse surrounding the Citadel was a strangeness which only served to further the impression of something fine discarded. Where any other city will ultimately see the expansion of communities built outside the bounds of its protective wall, spreading out and away as the strictures of the skirts become increasingly tight against a burgeoning population, no such thing had happened at Avium. Nor, Sily assured, did it occur at any of the Groves six great cities for that matter, such expansion being outside the obscure tenets by which Protectors governed and therefore being expressly outlawed as a place for inhabitation. The Citadels had spent centuries existing in such a fashion, stacking upon and cannibalizing buildings as the inhabitants demanded, but always and exclusively within the towering walls which define the gargantuan constructs.
Heartwood, the ancient center of Avium and where Simen and Pica had spent much of their formative years, had been like that, ancient buildings continually torn down and carted away by the most enterprising developers of the moment, entire rows of buildings destabilized for a fine stone fountain in Highhill or a roseate statue for the Protector's gardens in Clifftop Castle. When the two had been young, it hadn't been totally uncommon for buildings to collapse in the night, killing dozens when ten families, cramming into a single second-floor apartment to escape the chill of winter’s night, fell through onto the dozen others below.
The other districts they had visited in the years since joining Mellivora, the times when they would be lent out for various city functions or when they got the rare night off to explore, were often exceptionally nice in comparison to the Old City. They were more often made of rich hardwoods these days rather than the stone that used to be favored, the growth of the city demanding a much more readily produced material than chiseled rock, and structures much higher than any but the most well-crafted and maintained masonry.
Some, Sily had informed Pellia, stood a shocking five-stories over the streets, reinforced with gargantuan timbers floated from somewhere up north and further stabilized by bridges that overshadowed the busy commonfolk below; stitching structures together into environments totally distinct from those of the greater city. Sily spoke often of these areas with a sort of wonder that had infected the younger woman who, much like the Populan woman herself, was a fantastic climber and relished the idea of a risky race across the catwalks and rooftops of Avium with the more senior soldier.
Pellia had never seen the Jewel of the Grove before, only hearing stories over a fire or during a march since being adopted into the squad. She walked slack-jawed and wide-eyed, staring at the citadel and endeavoring to fully comprehend its size or the pervasive opulence perceivable even from miles away.
‘How can it be so big?’ she asked nobody in particular, her voice quiet and distant. ‘Oxycarpa was huge, but I had no idea when you said it was small by comparison! How many people are in there?’ She turned to Pica with a raised eyebrow apparently intending the question for him. He looked to the inquisitive foreigner and grinned through sweat which, despite the cool autumn air blowing across the plains from the sea, continued to seep from his fevered brow.
‘Wouldn’t have the faintest idea,’ he responded, turning to the raven-haired interrogator, ‘never saw more than a few square blocks of it myself growing up. And when we enlisted, we were kept in the gatekeep until we were whisked off to Pyrus a week-or-so later.’
‘Since then,’ Simen finished, ‘we only know what we see on patrol and that isn’t often anything other than docks, markets, and high-class parties.’ He snorted, stopping his attempts to roll another twist of green leaf to shrug at Pellia before resuming his task unfazed
‘Maybe a million,’ Pica pondered, ignoring his friend. He looked back to Tacca who was bringing up the rear of the group.
‘Closer to two,’ she answered factually, ‘that’s at least what I heard a Maester say over cups when we were last here a couple years back. Lord knows where they keep them all though, more people moving in all the time from the outer provinces, nowhere to house them is what I hear.
‘Glad we have our own lodging in the gatekeep, some of the things coming out of the lower districts…’ the sergeant faded away suddenly, catching herself wandering into conversation that was probably more need-to-know. She didn’t continue and, as Pica turned in his saddle at her words, the officer was coincidentally distracted by something gooey stuck to her armor.
The Triplets paid little attention to the city growing ever taller before them beyond a few comments about shops and bathhouses. Growing up they had been to Avium any number of times, either going with their mother to negotiate trade and taxes with the great houses, or to deliver a particularly good stock of horses to the Generals’ Garrison or the Protector’s private stables with their father. Instead, the brothers traded jokes and jostled one another, eating cold chicken bought off a merchant they had passed on the south road outside Serotina that morning and surreptitiously trading a skin of pilfered ale between full-mouthed chuckles. Pica had long since stopped asking how they always managed to find something to eat no matter where they were or the language spoken there, and he was certain they might have starved once or twice if not for the Populan siblings wandering off and returning with at least enough to get through to the next day’s march.
The collective malaise of a long journey almost over, the desire to just be finished, was starting to be shaken from the Company as the final miles to Avium grew shorter before them. This last campaign had stretched three long years and had taken them far across the southern Grove, showing them thousands of miles of territory and uncountable nights under cold stars and on frozen earth.
The final leg had been no easier on them than the body of the campaign either, the road from Cerasus back to Avium becoming a slog through the pervasive, damp chill of the plains and stretching a two-week journey into a misery twice that length. The conditions of the roads, churned, cut, and sodden from the mass movement of people and supplies streaming eastward from Avium, had made things slow for the drained company, often forcing them to cut their own path to bypass a washed-out section or a caravan that had become hopelessly engulfed in autumn mud.
Lieutenant Strozzi had shown curious aggrievement at the inconvenience and more than once he had screamed at the stuck caravanners, berating them for their stupidity and hurling words like ‘settler’ at them as if it were a slur of some sort. It was as confusing to Pica as it was Pellia, but the Sergeant assured them that some things were ‘city politics’ and not for a soldier to overly worry about.
Soon, the roads would freeze with the onset of true winter from the northwest and Dorylus would likely take advantage of the crisp, clear days to grate and reset the Protectorate Highroad on their return from duties in Cerasus. But for now, the great roads were an intolerable slog that made ponies useless and wagons something worse. The Company had left many of those behind in either Serotina or Primula as the road got progressively worse heading west. Now, they were finally home and the empire had blessed their path with the speed of hard-packed, dry roads and few civilian travelers for the last day.
Sily drifted forward to peak over the shoulder of the ever-aloof Scribe as he illustrated from horseback. Where any soldier worth their salt can more-or-less sleep, eat, or piss while marching, Scribe could illustrate and write while doing just about anything at all. His pen flowed smoothly as he held the book in serene stillness, his legs gripping the saddle just so and his hips serving to stabilize him perfectly, never missing a punctuation point, over-crossing a T, or under-looping the tail of an F while they traveled. Occasionally, the woman to his rear offered her unsolicited feedback, offering an ‘oh, that color is perfect’ or the singular ‘amazing’ to his ear.
Of all the strange and wondrous things about the man, what never failed to awe Pica, who could read alright but had long since given up the ‘art’ of writing for anything other than emergencies, was his preternatural ability to ignore the beautiful, omnipresent woman all but perched upon his shoulder. He opened his mouth to remark upon the fact.
‘Oh! What’s that?’ Pellia was suddenly hopping in her saddle and pointing toward the rapidly enlarging walls of Avium Citadel ahead.
‘Shit, what is that?’ Sily was intrigued, taking a true interest in the city for the first time since it had come into view. She stood up in her saddle to get a better look.
Ahead of Fourth Squad, gasps and gestures indicated that many others in the Company were also noticing something: a slowly growing shape appearing from behind the immense walls. Soon, murmurs turned to shouts as the thing appeared fully in the illumination of the afternoon sun.
‘A balloon!’ a voice somewhere to the front roared incredulously.
Others joined in, some enjoying the idea and others denying the possibility altogether. How could it be a balloon? It was clearly a massive thing, even from such a distance, based solely on its bulk relative to the wall it was attempting to crest. What sort of balloon could do that?
‘It’s an airship. Captain informed the Lieutenant we might catch sight of it yesterday. Something must have delayed it.’ Tacca informed them officiously and with a lowered voice. ‘One of three,’ she added conspiratorially as they turned to her as one. The Sergeant touched her nose in the universal sign of secrets intended to be kept and remained silent. Rusa leaned further back in his saddle perilously to better look at her, but that was all she offered. Urge to offer a bit of gossip satiated, she dismissed herself to ride forward to find the aforementioned Lieutenant Strozzi. They watched her go, unsure what to make of the idea of a flying boat.
‘An airship…’ Sily exhaled in wonderment. To her left, her brothers mirrored her admiring look as the thing better caught the light fully to illuminate into a shining blue and gold gem in the sky. The Company gasped as one at the sight.
Machines, it had long been clear to Pica and Simen, enthralled the Populan mind in a way that they simply couldn’t comprehend. For the two poor boys from Heartwood, their only experience with machinery growing up had been the hulking presses, thrashers, mills, and pumps they had sometimes been hired to operate in exchange for a maggoty biscuit and a place to sleep. Often, one would rest beneath the very same machinery they had worked all day, ensuring they would be the faster to work the following day but enjoying the copious heat which poured off the machinery after a fourteen-hour shift. For them, machines didn’t represent promise and innovation so much as they did desperation and horror; the spirit-damping and body-crushing of those who have given up on a happy or even long life before the onset of puberty.
Machines, Pica thought to himself bitterly, we are always eaten by the machines.
Where for years the minds of himself and his peers had been almost incessantly consumed with raw survival from one terrible campaign to the next, he saw things differently today as he pondered machines and purpose. The irony that he and Simen had enlisted in the greatest grist mill of them all to escape the blatant abuses of the manufactories and bosses back home, visiting a different flavor of brutality against people somewhere far away, was becoming increasingly hard to navigate.
He looked to his closest friend.
Pica had tried to explain his misgivings to him over the past weeks, taking to their quiet moments together to seek comfort in his lifelong partner, but the man had just shrugged and issued the usual non-committal ‘gotta survive’-type answer before forgetting it altogether. As far as he could tell, Simen had never and would never consider any of it in a critical light. He returned his gaze to the ‘airship’ distastefully, not even knowing in truth what it was but already under the assumption that it would lead to fresh horrors and death just as it always had.
‘It’s coming over the wall. Look!’
For a moment, the thing indeed hovered above the towering wall, its silhouette becoming a perfect circle as it turned slowly to face the slowing line of troops, aligning northward along the arrow-straight highway they rode south. Then it plummeted into the shadow of the outer wall, dropping toward the ground first slowly, then accelerating as the angle of its descent steepened exponentially. As it fell, the shape of the airship’s canvas top was outlined against the bedimmed, pink sheen dancing behind. It was a sharpened oval-shaped thing, thicker in the middle and tapered to points at both ends, but with broad fin-looking appendages sprouting from what they assumed was the rear of the pitched vessel. It speckled gold or copper in brief flashes as it moved through shifting shadows, catching the glints of silver that reflected from the marble’s veined surface; trading the last light of the day between them in fading leaps as it hurtled towards an obvious end at the wall’s base far below.
Pellia almost fell from her saddle as she leapt up to watch the inevitable, slipping slightly on her horse’s unsecured bridle strap before standing tall, tiptoeing on the saddle and craning her neck to watch the falling shape. It was a trick learned during her youth that she had almost adapted to the saddles popular among the southern soldiers, a shooting motion upward from straddle to perfect balance atop the often surprised animal. It was not only impressive, but useful in all manner of circumstance. It had been this trick which had first created a true bond between Sily and the young castaway, their mutual love of horses and similarly competitive natures soon pitting them against one another in a timeless battle of burgeoning siblinghood. Now, she looked to the elder woman uncertain. ‘Should it be doing that?’
There was a collective shrug, but nobody offered any words that could possibly be better informed than she herself could come up with under the circumstances. All along the line of soldiers, similarly stunned looks could be seen on most faces.
‘Oh shit.’ Simen sounded enthused, ‘get ready for this.’ He jostled Rusa who was matching his grin excitedly.
Just as they were ready to watch the thing disintegrate in a cloud of exploding earth and timber, four horizontal sails exploded outward on flexible spars that had been, up until now, tucked tight and tense against the ship’s central underbody. Like giant seagulls’ wings, they spanned outward along long arcs to catch the air, pulling sailcloth taut and engulfing thousands of gallons of air in scooped canvas.
Even at their distance, the Company heard the boom of the air on the ground below, the great sound rolling like thunder across the flat plain. They looked in shock at the tumult of dirt and sand that erupted from the base of the wall, the great airship now hurtling toward them above the stretching plain.
They might have thought it had crashed and bounced considering the colossal amount of dust blasted upward under the sudden draft of the ship, and for the briefest moment, they weren’t sure it wouldn't careen back into the ground in a moment despite the mass of canvas deployed at the last moment. They were awed as the airship attempted to steady itself, maintaining its flight a few dozen feet above the ground and moving at a speed that felt impossible for something so ungainly. After a few tenuous dips, it succeeded in stabilizing into a steady up-and-down motion and moving at a speed they thought comparable to that of a sprint horse. From their position though, it was difficult to say with much precision until they knew the true size of the beast.
Soldiers began to shift uneasily as a universal certainty dawned throughout the ranks: they didn’t actually know what that thing was, and it was heading directly toward the Badgers. A brief moment of panic tracked its way down the line but was promptly snuffed by Captain Haidarum’s pounding shout. He twisted in his saddle, sending his voice over their heads with enough belly to reach even Fourth Squad in the rear.
‘Mellivora! Hold!’
He offered no other reassurance or information, the words bouncing down the long line of soldiers as officers parroted the order for good measure. They held, all coming to a complete stop on the wide road and tightening their holds on the increasingly shifty horses. To the rear, oxen began lowing and donkeys brayed as the long train of wagons, both military and civilian, stuttered to a crooked halt as well. Little by little, they too began to catch wind of the events at the front of the march.
‘Make room!’
It was an incredible order that drew a scoff from Sily but as one the entire force split along the road to create a long pathway down the highway. It wouldn’t do much for the less-maneuverable wagons and pack beasts to the rear, but there was little to be done about that in the moment. They hunkered over the horses’ lowered heads, some covering their rolling eyes with a handkerchief or turning their great heads away. Others dismounted entirely and tempted fate by standing along the edge of the great drainage channels dug down both sides of the elevated roadway. The tension mounted as they waited, the ship looming improbably larger while never seeming to gain ground outside the shadow racing along the road toward them; the distance between it and the train of people and beasts was frustratingly uncertain as soldiers snuck glances around shifty ponies.
Then it was over them, briefly shading all and dragging a cacophony of creaking groans and booms behind its hulking mass; the screaming timber and canvas keeping the machine aloft compressed a stinging blast of air in its wake, the immense pressure plucking the furthest entrenched bits of dirt and dust from the clothes, saddles, and carts below, hurling them into the turbulent air to swirl chaotically around the soldiers’ heads. Horses shrieked under the flash of shadow, blinding sand, and the sudden popping in their ears; one reared and threw its head wildly, slamming into its rider whose attention was otherwise occupied. She shouted wordlessly as she was thrown to the side, trying to roll and instead tumbling past her comrades into the ditch where she lay unmoving. A couple of them, displaying the aplomb and insignia of Heteractis’ platoon, handed off their reins and set about offering her aid, clearly unmoved by the event and quickly jumping to action as chaos enveloped much of the rest of the Company.
Pica, meanwhile, stood awed by the craftsmanship of the balloon and carriage as it flashed overhead. The former was of heavily stitched layers of mottled, sky-colored linen material, it bulged through the diamond-shaped holes of the massive brass netting molding it into form. To the soldier it resembled a netted ham left to cure among smokehouse rafters, the strange coloring bringing to mind the diverse molds which colonize the thick skin of meat left to dry-age over a long summer. Similarly, it shone with grease or wax which, Pica surmised, had been rubbed into the fabric to help seal it against the air. He wondered if, as wax was said to help a ship to slip through water or a sled across ice, doing so would similarly help the ungainly thing to glide through the air as well. It looked rigid to his eyes, like he could walk across the its top were he so inclined.
The wooden body itself seemed to have been designed with sleekness to match the balloon's. It hung from the thick, ovular ring which sinched the netting tight at the bottom of the canvas with thick, twisting cables of what appeared to be steel. It reminded of the long, thin, almost dagger-like vessels favored for warfare in the Atra Sea to the south, the shallow-bottomed boats which allowed one to maneuver swiftly and nimbly in shallow waters and even up larger rivers during the wet seasons. The wood was pale despite rich, golden sealant and was likely from a lightwood like the white pine harvested on the steep banks of the northern Hematis. Favored as it was for the flexibility and lightness, the planks had been craftily steamed to form generous scoop-like indentations along the belly which, if building ships for the sky was the same as for the sea, may have served to help the airship to stay aloft as it glided forward on its quartet of sweeping wings.
Soldier-sailors peered down at them through glass-shielded portholes, cramming together and laughing at the turmoil their passage caused below. Simen threw an unsavory hand gesture toward them as he spun away from the churning dust, they laughed and returned the favor with relish. Beneath them and visible through a second line of portholes, people shouted and moved frantically as if working invisible oars.
Pica had little time to consider them as the thing was suddenly past, drawing his eyes to the rear and the magnificent array of small fins positioned there. Some shifted slightly as if sensing some breeze, bending slightly in response to the pressure of passing air and keeping the ship pointed forward on its journey. They spread out wide in all manner of directions, reminding him of the graceful river fish they had once seen in the serene waters around Polita. There were two other fins, larger, horizontal things, which waved up and down in a steady, alternating rhythm reminiscent of a swimmer’s feet. They shuttled the vessel forward efficiently, blowing gusts behind and providing much more thrust than one might have guessed possible in their aim to extend the momentum of the plunging exit from Avium.
‘Bastards!’ Simen spat, wiping his face with a handkerchief. ‘Imp bastards!’
‘Gods,’ Pica gobbed as well, clearing clay from his mouth contemptuously, ‘That was absolutely terrifying.’
‘More like amazing!’ Sily and Pellia stared after the thing with starry eyes.
‘Must be headed to Cerasus,’ Rusa postulated, returning his eyes to the road and beginning to coax his pony away from where it had instinctively tried to prance into the drainage ditch, ‘Dorylus Corp. has probably wrapped up the first phase of construction there by now.’
A pit that had been growing in Pica opened at the sound of the name. There had been no discussion of what he had seen there with Pellia and Sily, not even with Tacca. Strozzi had taken them to their intended destination as if he had just stumbled upon them and joined them on the way. They gathered the requested supplies for Tacca - a brand new backplate for Pica - and headed back. Without saying a word, the Lieutenant had assured them that nothing good would come of discussing the misadventure into the wash yard and the room of corpses hidden within. That had been solidly reaffirmed by the horrors of the night in Haidarum’s quarters that followed.
Through his musings, he could hear Pellia’s high voice rattling out questions rapid-fire. She hadn’t seemed too concerned by events either way and hadn’t mentioned anything at all, not even when only in the company of Sily and Pica. In turn, they hadn’t mentioned the torture and probable murder of Anticlea which the young woman had been gracefully absent from.
‘What a rush that must be! How can we ride one? How can that be a balloon? They were actually flying!’ Pellia heaved great breaths as she struggled to battle the rush of adrenaline that had followed the flyover.
Simen objected to even the thought. ‘Bugger that! Rather go out to sea than get on whatever that abomination is, and I still can’t swim.’ He said the last defiantly, as if proud of the fact. ‘How can that possibly be anything other than a deathtrap, you tell me that.’
All was silent for a moment as most agreed. There was something inherently off-putting about moving at such speeds in a contraption flying a few meters above the ground. It had felt as if they had been in an earthquake as much as a tornado, what would it be like to crash such a thing. Simen was making some good points and he hadn’t even really started yet.
‘How does it fly?’ Pellia’s light voice broke in.
‘That’s what I’m saying!’ Simen gestured his hand emphatically, ‘doesn’t make much sense, does it?’
Ever argumentative and obviously enraptured by the airship, Sily rolled her eyes and countered. ‘With heat probably. The observation balloons we saw up in…’ she gestured vaguely at Rusa and Alces for a moment, ‘…where?’
‘Polita,’ the scarred one responded, ‘the problem with the woodsmen during our first campaign in the far north.’
Simen shivered involuntarily to his rear. He nudged his pony to speed a little too aggressively as it got back behind Rusa’s and it shot him a dark glance over its shoulder. He glared back instinctively but winked as the horse huffed indignantly and turned its head with a great rolling of eyes.
‘Right, Polita,’ Sily continued, ‘those engineers we collected from Oxycarpa on the way north had those balloons they used for spying over the forest. They used little fires under a blanket or something to work. The smoke lifted them is how one of the scribes described it to then.
‘But those were smaller things with maybe two people max, experimental. They didn’t look anything like that beast.’ She sounded pleased that something so marvelous could have been created in just the last three or four years since those days in the quiet, dark forest of the tundra.
‘Could be from somewhere other than Oxycarpa. Maybe it came from C-o-T or something?’ Rusa pondered.
Alces looked at his brother like the blast had rinsed his brain a bit. ‘How could it be from City-of-Three? That is a Syndicalist hub, and not even authorized to trade within the Grove outside Alban ports.’
‘A lot could have changed since we left.’ Rusa snorted. ‘Been three years. And what do we know of Protectorate politics? Which Citadels can trade with which and where you’re allowed to pursue which passions? For all we know, the Order may have thrown another Pro-’
‘Stow that, trooper.’ Tacca hissed, cutting off the rambling man. ‘Especially here.’ Nonplussed, Sily returned to Simen with a grin. ‘Maybe the warmth here helps somehow, the ballooners up north could only keep those aloft for a few hours in the afternoon before it got too cold for them to stay up anymore.’
Pica shrugged. ‘I think that might have had more to do with the poor fools who were sent up in the things than it did with the balloons themselves. One of them died and they didn’t notice until the thing came down for want of fuel.’
Simen shivered again despite the almost oppressive heat of the already stilling air about them. ‘I thought Heartwood was bad during the winter, what with that damned wind off the Grey Bitch, but nah, I thought we were all dead once we got far enough into those forests.’
The Triplets and Pica all nodded in unison as they too recalled the horrific frosts that had descended upon them north of what was already the Grove’s northernmost Citadel.
‘Those first fights were something else,’ Pica recalled, a smile coming to his face despite the topic, ‘I couldn’t believe what we had gotten into.’
Sily grunted, ‘can’t believe you didn’t just die.’ She winked to Pellia. ‘He was the scrawniest thing Pell; you should’ve seen it. Of all the people in our recruitment cohort, I thought he would have been the first to buy it. You can bet we made a wager on it.’ She tapped her recently enriched pocket for emphasis.
A laugh escaped Tacca from their rear. ‘You know Simen would never allow such a thing.’ She looked affectionately at the brawny man feigning inattention. ‘A bone fide guardian angel, this one.’
‘Well, I’m not saying where my money was at.’ Simen offered with a too big smile.
Pica looked between them, mouth agape and offended on two fronts as his closest friends poked at insecurities he hadn’t known were there. He remained silent and fumed, the rest of the squad laughed at the indignance on his face with even a horse offering a happy whinny and a snort at his expense.
‘Should’ve seen yourself is all,’ Sily continued, ‘even after battle school you weren’t the man nor the soldier you are today.’
The words did little to soften Pica’s hurt, but he stowed that with a bitter grunt.
‘Can we ride one?’ Pellia, ever quick to sense Pica’s emotional turbulence, turned to the sergeant expectantly in a flawless change of conversation. ‘An airship?’
‘Doubt it,’ Tacca laughed and gave a powerless shrug, ‘that’s the first I’ve seen of any such thing, just as you. Can’t imagine they have many more of them, and if they did, I don’t think joyrides for explorative young northerners would be on the list of standard duties.’
Pellia groaned but stopped short as she noticed a wink making its way to her across the Triplets. They had arrived at a wordless agreement, and it was settled. Rusa leaned in to Pellia conspiratorially, ‘I’m in if you are.’ She smiled broadly.
The dust still hung in the air and coated all in a layer of black silt as the North Gate of Avium finally swung open before the Company’s approach. They were immense and heavy things, each door requiring a team of five mules to pull open on hinges dripping with thick grease, their braying harmonizing with the groaning of the unquenchable iron bracings. The soldiers, having long ago loosened armor and tunics to admit what little breeze there was to their boiling skin, hastened toward the cool shelter within just as they were wide enough to manage a few ponies at a time, seeking escape from the oppressive heat that had settled onto the land despite the season.
The stone of this section of wall had been carved to exact purpose, a great mass of rock hollowed out to create a tunnel into the Citadel. The accompanying guardhouses, similarly excavated from the singular slab and mirrored on either side of the tunnel, were fortified with sturdy white oak doors and shutters, giving the impression of a stone barracks block with the number of guards milling about officiously within the visible rooms and corridors. They halted in their duties as the road-weary soldiers pushed into the welcoming shade within.
Captain Haidarum sat high upon his great black horse at the head of Mellivora as it passed through the impossibly high walls of Avium Citadel. He basked in the warmth of the afternoon as a cat might, stretched fully to soak in the sun yet alert to all around. His personal retinue of hardened officers followed close, forming a tight and well-polished cap and to the line of Mellivora soldiers, horses, and baggage trains stretching far behind.
The commanding officer was a small, thin, and generally unassuming man who, if not for his position, might have been presumed to be of the mid-country from which they were just returning. He carried himself well among his troops and, in defiance of his almost-diminutive stature, flourished in an environment where many earned their way on brawn alone. Any who knew of him knew the mistake as well of assuming him anything other than deeply clever in furthering his own nebulous designs.
The officer's armor was ornate and of clearly prodigious cost, drawing all eyes to him like an exotic water bird or an illusionist's illuminations when he attended the odd social event. The steel breastplate was a marvel of form-molded scales clinging to his lithe frame both snuggly and with supreme flexibility, shining an iridescent blue-grey color with even the slightest shift of light or shadow. His limb guards were of similar-colored but forged of a smoother metal, each one covered intricately in engraving no thicker than a hair dancing crisscrossing spirals of deep claret from torso to wrist and heel. The gauntlets, crafted of thick leather pulled from tusked sea-bulls hunted in the furthest northern reaches, had been sooted to permanent blackness and lined with slate-grey metal plates which hinged and rode flexibly over his delicate fingers. Altogther, the enseeble marked him as a knight at the least and more likely, a true-born noble of some prestigious house on Highhill; an oddity in non-administrative positions within the Unitary and an object of surprising authority in all circles. He raised his hand slightly and battle horns erupted from his rear, filling the tunnel deafeningly as the Company surged forward at double-march, eager to finally return to Keeptown and the place they called home.
By the time Fourth Squad finally passed through the gate, the soldiers and guards around had begun to cheer and shout raucously in celebration of their return, their own trumpeteers joining the bugling in impromptu festivity. Pica blushed under the fanfare and congratulations from the blue-and-silver clad city guards stationed therein; ever more people exited the seemingly endless inbuilt guardrooms, adding their cheers and raised fists in salute to the victorious troopers.
Tales of the swift decimation of those damnable red-and-gold Onari weeks prior had spread fast and, as always, the story had clearly morphed a bit along the way. Anyone who had anything to do with this specific sector of society were well-aware of Mellivora’s exploits purging the Grove of insurgents over the last years and from some of the shouts, it seemed they had killed some two hundred rebels in Cerasus alone. Although the truth was likely closer to a quarter that number, none were inclined to answer the odd request for validation.
Celebrations of the ‘Rabid Badgers’ were somehow more vigorous as the road-weary soldiers entered Keeptown proper. Regal knights and soldiers in a vast array of colored livery and all manner of rushing stable hands, squires, and servants joined the welcoming, or at least stopped what they were doing to watch, as the dirty and exhausted ranks of Company Mellivora paraded smartly into the central square.
Some in the gathered crowd wore looks of anger or sadness as well; more than a few, it was clear, were less-than pleased about the ‘Reaping of Cerasus,’ likely having friends among the traveling harvesters or woodsmen who worked near the industry towns of the central empire. It wasn't uncommon for recruitment campaigns to range to the most farflung farmstead in the foothills, a small cottage along a remote forest's edge, in search of eager trainees; many surely feared for the lives of loved ones some three hundred miles east. Pica feared he may have even seen the sheen of active malice among some of faces and was shocked that it was shown so openly in the military stronghold itself. He resolved to discuss it with Tacca later and turned his attention to the way ahead.
Called ‘Keeptown’ by most, the gatekeep-turned military compound was built on the remnants of some settlement that had attempted to survive behind secondary walls built snuggly within the great roseate skirt beyond. More like a micro-city itself, it was well-apportioned and had survived long enough at least to build an expansive set of estates, a monumental place of worship, and a surprising acreage of viable farmland before whatever had led to its abandonment prior to the Grove’s appropriation of the Citadel. Today, after so many generations of Unitary management, the impressive inner fortification had transformed into a stack of wood-and-stone that mirrored the development found in many up-built districts in the city proper.
Much of its original architecture survived today, the grand design's uses evolving over time and the grounds being reallocated according to the needs and desires of the empire's mercenary armies. Under the unyielding eye of the Maester’s, a secondary library for their overflow from afield had taken much of the space surrounding their tower there. Now their ancient tomes were being stored in the only place they thought even passingly safe enough after their own allegedly endless vaults had ultimately become less so.
Similarly, new uses had been found for other areas of the compound as well. In an age that was generally apathetic to any theology outside the ceremonial and a military environment that could demand extreme levels of medical care at very short notice, much of the cathedral had been allocated to Doc Pan many years before in recognition of his mind for innovation and excellence. He had built an expansive hospital beneath the stained glass and sculpted arches of the vaulted ceilings, providing a first-of-its-kind place of rest and rehabilitation for the soldiers who served the Grove’s interests at home and abroad. It attracted the best surgeons, nurses, and researchers from within the empire and beyond, positively bustling with the brilliance that such places attract and providing innovative treatments which could not be replicated elsewhere. Pica had watched the doctor’s renown grow much over the years as he pursued a unique method of field research which seemed applicable to the old man alone, he smiled as he thought of how much the attention must bother the cantankerous surgeon.
On cue, the company came to a halt outside the massive hospital, dismounting on a far edge of what had once been a market and which was now a sprawling training yard. The keep stablemaster’s many apprentices were among them promptly, mechanically leading away ponies made angsty by the enticing promise of cool water, fresh oats, and a warm stall they sensed had finally arrived. Soldiers hastily removed saddlebags before an impatient attendant could arrive and begin pulling away the animals, piling all their belongings together on a tall-sided cart behind an unamused mule for carriage to their barracks deeper in Keeptown.
The order to disperse came just as it rounded a corner out of sight, the Captain waving a lazy hand as he beelined to his personal quarters; the lieutenants were barking and pointing before the officer took his second step and soon all of Mellivora were left to their own devices for what felt like the first time in three years.
Fourth Squad, as one, headed straight to their barracks, catching up their meandering luggage easily and following in the wake the slow animal created behind it. While many in the Company were now free to indulge their immediate desires and undoubtedly would, Tacca’s troopers were allowed no such alleviation. They did not need to be ordered to stow their equipment before they were fully released for the day and they did so without excessive grumbling. A train of their Mellivora peers streamed behind in a long, weary line, most sergeants seeming to similarly prescribe to the ‘accountability’ method of soldiery advertised by the likes of Lieutenants Strozzi and Heteractis.
Navigating the dense space of the micro-city, while initially frustrating, was easy enough once you had done it a few times; Pellia clung to her friends closely as they squeezed their way through alleys and turned down unmarked streets seemingly at random. They pushed past teams of merchants frantically racing to unload carts. They rushed to get their payslips, all but throwing their crates, barrels, and bags in an effort to finish the task before the inner-city gates were locked for the evening and they would be forced to pay the extortionate rates a bed and meal cost in one of the few inns available to non-military personel in Keeptown.
At some point in the long history of the Company, Mellivora leadership had bargained well for the accommodations maintained for them in the gatekeep; the complex of long, white buildings greeted them warmly with a sparseness they had come to love over the years and the Squad sighed collectively, relieved as they passed through the concreted walls that enclosed the tight compound. It certainly wasn’t the newest of the quartering areas that were allocated to the various Unitary organizations which ebbed and flowed through the gatekeep, but it did appear to have received a fresh whitewash since they were last here and old wooden shutters which had been broken before were now replaced with bright, fresh lumber. The compound was neither especially large compared to some others nor particularly well-positioned within the larger complex. What it was, however, was quiet, removed from most noise of the greater keep, and subdivided within to provide an unusual amount of privacy for Haidarum's troopers that was unimaginable in any other unit.
Each platoon had one floor of the bunkhouses on either side of the compound while the officer-class enjoyed the entirety of the ‘Old House’ in the center-rear. This main building was from a time of luxury for some previous empire and was postulated by some old soldiers to have once been a palace by the standards of whichever time that may have been. It enjoyed high ceilings and arching stone windows that captured the light for much of the day; sweeping apartments for all manner of purposes and proclivities were spread abundantly throughout. There were private baths built into the cliffside which backed the compound and from which much of its stone had been hewn, providing any member of the Company a place guaranteed to be free of unscrupulous eyes or carrytales. The main kitchen occupied a section on the ground floor of the house while a library enjoyed a mirrored position opposite it and offered soldiers a chance at sharpening their literary skills as well as those needed for combat. A carriage house near the iron gates had been converted into a proper smithy some years prior and today provided the enterprising trooper with the opportunity to save, or even earn, some additional silver clippings for a bit of hard work behind a forge or hammer. The two ‘small houses’ around the yard were reserved for the general soldiery of the unit. The leftmost housed First and Second Platoons under Lieutenants Naja and Carpitalpa respectively while the same went for Lieutenants Heteractis and Strozzi and their soldiers on the opposite side of the yard. Each platoon was provided a floor with toilets, squad-sized bunkrooms, and a private set of apartments for the sergeants as well as office space for union and administrative purposes.
All was part of Captain Haidarum’s philosophy of leadership which he strove to embed within each and every Badger that he recruited into the ranks of the storied unit. When a soldier is well-tuned in all ways, capable of reason and multifaceted in their approach to problems, they are much more capable than any standard imperial or rebel soldier. The same went for the kitchen, which was always well-stocked with foods for the peckish or the aspiring cook. On weekends, a cook from the city proper would be summoned for the soldiers who would gather in the main hall or take tables out onto the yard to share a meal and discuss any issues which may have arisen within the platoons.
The latter part, while a mandatory aspect of the Unitary Army’s charter, was not required but once a year, but Haidarum saw the opportunity it provided for further consolidation of his leadership of the Company. Reigning over the meals from a raised dais alongside his officers as they officiated any complaints or obligations with the soldiers, most often these were nonevents, a moment of routine handbook reading before all sat down and a cask was rolled in to great applause; due to this, the Captain had never once faced an election challenger that was not more than perfunctory or suffering a momentary lapse in judgement from which they swiftly recovered.
Fourth Squad rushed up the narrow wooden stairs to their quarters, the Triplets provoking a shoving race that ended with them all pouring into the room in a tumble.
‘Get your crap off my bunk, Rusa!’ Sily shouted at her brother as he once again tried to claim the top-bunk for himself.
It was the latest in a long feud for the highest perch since they were children growing up in the thriving industrial heart of Tremula; her large brother obliged with a teasing grin that reflected itself perfectly upon the face of his roguish sister, methodically moving his belongings from her bed and into a haphazard pile on his own bunk as she watched impatiently.
‘What do you think is for dinner?’ Alces asked, impatient and all but drooling nearby.
‘Think it’s meatballs?’ inquired Rusa, ‘maybe some bacon?’ He carefully inspected his canteen before tossing it with a clang onto the rest of his gear.
‘And fresh black bread,’ the Alces added, becoming more enthusiastic in his own unpacking as his stomach rumbled audibly.
‘Butter’ their sister sighed, grabbing the storage chest affixed to the head of her bunk by its wide leather straps. She set it aside carefully, opening her field bag beside it for sorting and inventory just as Tacca strode in upon thumping boots.
The brothers, choosing as they oft did on the first day home, had cut short their unpacking and simply deposited half-emptied packs into their chests before shoving them under their respective bunks. Tacca glared at them over a torn jerkin of Pica’s she was inspecting, her eyes a clear indication of her thoughts on them leaving without taking care of a few key, and more importantly as far as she was concerned, mandatory tasks after returning to base. They shrugged apologetically at the condemnatory look of their sergeant, waiting for just a second before Rusa gave Alces a playful shove and hurriedly finished dumping things from his bag and into the box. He shifted things about wildly, taking stock and mumbling reminders to himself as he worked.
Soon, a semblance of ‘organization’ had manifested that would adequately meet the expectations of their strict and imposing squad commander, she watched Rusa with raised eyebrows until he too had finished and although she raised her nose at their efforts, she did ultimately provide them the nod they so desperately desired. With quick salutes, they tumbled over one another as they raced to investigate the smells that had greeted them from the kitchens as they first crossed the yard.
Sily watched them go with the disgusted look perfected by sisters everywhere. With a sigh, she turned to the sheepish woman standing beside her. ‘Let’s get washed up and find some clean clothes, Pell. Here, this bunk isn’t taken, you can have it if you want.’ She indicated the girl to the proffered bed. ‘It’s close to the hearth, so if it gets too hot there is another unused bed nearer the door.’ She gestured to ensure Pellia saw that one as well.
‘Thank you.’ Pellia sounded small all of the sudden. Up until she had stepped into the room, she had felt as one with the members of Fourth Squad but now, now she wasn’t sure she belonged at all as she looked at the room around her. All around, she saw the telltale signs of a home as the soldiers absentmindedly went about their tasks, conforming naturally to a normal here she herself had no knowledge of. Pica produced a bundle of wood from she knew not where and had already set himself to building a fire in the small, well-built hearth by which she was intended to sleep. Sily, meanwhile, had begun rummaging through a closet, the door of which Pellia hadn’t noticed either. Her stomach churned.
‘Take a seat, Little Dove.’ Tacca’s worn hand appeared firmly on her shoulder, it guided the lightheaded woman to a chair next to a window and deposited her there. A glass appeared in her hand and water followed into it with a splash. ‘Drink.’
She did.
‘Look, I know this is a lot all at once. I was worried that you may be uncomfortable after everything you’ve been through, both with us and before.’ She paused for a moment kneeling down to get a good look at Pellia. ‘I can get you anything you need, we can. Mellivora is your home which means that so is this compound, and anything within it that the rest of the squad has access to, you do as well.’
She got no response in words, but she accepted the tight-jawed nod the woman offered as an acceptable substitute. Sily returned with an armful of old but serviceable civvies for Pellia to sort through and soon she was taking the young woman’s arm in one hand and their clean clothes in the other, leading the still shocked, and awfully confused, castaway toward the effervescent hot springs in the in the caverns to the rear of the garrison.
Pica and Simen smiled behind Tacca’s back briefly, knowing that the hot springs weren’t the only thing Sily sought in those old caverns and that Scribe, having slipped off long before they arrived at the limestone yard of Mellivora Barracks, would likely meet them there later to paint for her. He wondered how long Pellia would last in just the company off those two and the ever-strange tension that seemed to float around them.
‘I’m off too’ Simen announced loudly and for little apparent benefit, laying a hand on Pica’s shoulder as he passed. ‘Anything from the Quartermaster?’ he asked, his tone soft.
‘All good!’ Pica replied cheerily, raising a hand to grasp Simen’s gently and turning him a warm smile before returning to his own tasks. After a brief moment, he twisted back to his already departing friend. ‘You see old Doc Pan, grab me a bottle of whatever he gave me for my leg? That stuff works miracles, and it probably wouldn’t hurt to have a bottle on hand if possible.’
Simen raised his eyebrow at the request but nodded in response as he rounded the door and out of view.
‘Good lad’ Tacca declared brightly, shifting her gaze to Pica now seated alone on his bunk next to well-sorted and tidied accommodations. ‘Takes good care of you and Pell.’
Pica laughed. ‘Always has. Says that ‘protecting me from myself’ is his life’s calling.’ He paused, ‘saved me more times than I can count when we were growing up in Heartwood. Reckon that Pell got the same treatment too after he found her half-frozen and beat to hell off the Teeth last year.’
‘Couldn’t be happier about it.’ The sergeant replied, finishing her inspections of the quarters and eyeing a pile of soiled rags that used to be clothes distastefully. ‘That girl needs you two. Likely the opposite is true as well, I’d wager.’
Pica was silent, considering the truth of the sergeant’s words. ‘What was the deal in Cerasus?’ he asked in a rapid redirection.
She paused. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Did you know that we were heading to Cerasus when we chased them into the woods on the other side of the mountains?’ Pica accepted the rags from Tacca and tossed them into the fireplace for disposal, striking the flint sharply and kindling the hearth expertly. It flared, his expertly fluffed starter breathing of the room’s draft and drawing the embers inward hungrily.
Tacca gave a quiet ‘hmm’ that acknowledged his words but otherwise remained silent. She took a moment to consider how best to navigate the questions she knew were coming.
Pica was doing the same as he watched the nascent flames. Unsure of Tacca’s knowledge regarding the totality of events in Cerasus, he wondered what he could say that wouldn’t potentially put her in danger. At least, he suspected she would be put in danger, that was the message they had received from the arrival of their lieutenant with an auditor in tow. The way they had been whisked from there, shepherded away and then watched closely for the rest of the afternoon, had spooked Pica and Sily both. As had become the norm for him lately, he began considering all the horrible things that could befall his sergeant, all of his friends, if he spoke wrongly in the right person’s ears.
Pica moved away from a hearth already cheerfully warmed and shivered, pulling a table and its two chairs away from the window and into the golden light just beginning to dance across the well-built, if scuffed and aged, flooring. He reached into his jerkin slowly, pausing as his fingers touched, then produced the small paper found in Cerasus nearly a month prior. Tacca accepted it from his outstretched hand, turning it over curiously as he chose a chair where he could feed the fire.
After a moment she joined him and dropped the paper facedown onto the table before Pica, grabbing her own bag and sitting on the hearth to sift through it expertly. She produced the makings for tea and found the kettle already filled as she reached for it. The metalware hissed ever so gently as she hung from an old hook in the bricks to rock above the fire. By the time herbs had been properly measured and distributed into clay mugs, the water had begun to simmer. She poured it over the leaves in small circles before leaving the cups to steep in the center of the table.
They both sniffed the steam appreciatively for a moment, enjoying the calm and allowing at least a little of the last few weeks to roll off. She had chosen chamomile, it wafted sweetly alongside apples and something smoky, pushing away the anxieties and enforcing a blanket of contentedness that hugged the body in the warmth of the nearby flame. All seemed suddenly far, inconsequential, and Pica reached forward to clasp his cup firmly. He relaxed visibly with a tenuous first sip, settling more into the rough chair and looking into the flames with a sigh. Tacca allowed another few moments before she broke the calm.
‘What happened before the night in Cerasus with the Captain? When I sent you and the girls to grab supplies from the west gate.’ He didn’t answer immediately, and she hardly waited. ‘I saw you all return with the Lieutenant. And Pellia has been strange since.
‘As have you and Sily,’ she amended after a moment, ‘but you always act a bit off and Sily…’ she trailed off and shrugged instead. ‘But Pell… I worry about her, of course…
‘So?’ she prompted as he remained silent. Pica started.
‘So, what?’ ‘So, what happened? Where did the Lieutenant find you and what,’ she pushed the golden leaflet across the table to him, ‘is this?’
He grimaced, unsure what he could tell her. ‘We found it.’ he began slowly, pointing at the soft linen slip, ‘when we went for supplies. I think it belongs to the one the Captain called Anticlea.’
‘Where? How?’ She was quick, sending no reaction and immediately seizing the conversation with the question.
‘We fought; I killed her… I thought I killed her.’ He lifted his eyes to the sergeant and couldn’t tell what he saw there. ‘It was under a door,’ he stuttered, ‘I think where she came from.’
Tacca's eyes met his solidly, he saw genuine care for him there. She wanted to know that he was safe and if he needed her mothering as soldiers often did. But he thought he also saw a hardness there; a sharpness he had seen in the other officers on occasion. The same he had seen in Strozzi’s eyes the day they had found the dead townsfolk, the same he was sure had been in Haidarum’s after that. It terrified Pica. He considered lying to his leader and sipped nervously before continuing.
‘The explosion that hurt my leg,’ he lifted it for effect as he tried to start over, ‘she and I were fighting when it happened. She took shrapnel to the neck and I thought she died…I spent a good while there, trying to regain my senses and patching myself up. I don’t know how long I was out, Sarge.’ His words came faster. ‘She was dead, I-’
Her hand settled gently onto his own, interrupting his disjointed story and landing like a feather. It shocked him to silence, but he didn’t pull away.
Pica stared at the fire and blinked. It had gone low, and he wondered the time. It flared brilliantly as Tacca added a fresh log, the delicate floating embers blinking out as they moved freely into the small quarters. She settled back at the table beside him, refilling both their cups with hot water and taking a deep inhale of her own before pushing Pica’s into his hand as well.
‘Did you take it off of her body?’ The abruptness of her inquiry as she once again began to pull information from the morally embattled man did little to phase the subject. Pica returned to the conversation as if no pause had occurred, looking from the flames to the waiting Tacca.
‘No, but I think maybe she dropped it as I found her. I found it when we went to the west gate….’ He faded and hedged closer to the inevitable spilling of the truth.
‘So… the Lieutenant found you? Then how do you still have it?’
He took a nervous but substantial draught of his tea and looked back into the fire for a moment more to think. It had already settled again, radiating a bed of rubies that sparked as the sooty, centipede-like shapes that march across dying charcoal followed the sparse gasses that gave them life.
The pepperiness of the tea had grown as it steeped by the fire, the chamomile all but disappearing and a sweet, slippery flavor that clung to the tongue replacing it. It burned almost like liquor on the way down, coating the throat and esophagus until landing in a spreading pool of warmth in his stomach. Contentedness that had been growing in him unnoticed, swelled.
‘No, it was before the Lieutenant got there. He showed up later, after the boy got away.’ Pica’s words were lazy, his focus on the fire blinding him to how she shifted at the mention of the boy. ‘When Sily and Pellia went after him, I found the paper.’ His eyes tracked to where it still sat between them on the table.
‘And you "lost" the boy? What does that mean? Where did he go?’
‘Down a skinny alley, tried to take his treasure and run away…’ he faded for a moment, ‘got a good hit on me though.’ He pointed over his shoulder at his armor rack, identifying the obviously new plate. ‘Should have seen that dagger. Gods, I tried to get it. Acid, Sily said.’
Tacca looked between the man and the armor, lowering her voice even further. ‘I am pleased you weren’t hurt.’ She paused, considering which strings were most important to pull on further. Her eyes were drawn to a sound outside the door, they returned to Pica. ‘What was the treasure?’ she decided, and he grew sad.
‘His life. Family’s too, I expect. All wrapped up in cloth. Expensive cloth, a thick, deep red, looked like velvet… gold all over it, like the dagger… almost killed me, the bugger.’ He drifted again.
‘Does the Lieutenant know about the boy and his treasure?’
Pica shrugged; his head drooped a bit.
‘He showed up after.’ She declared her assumption.
He nodded. ‘When we found the room with the townsfolk in it. We-’ His stomach lurched suddenly; he shifted in his seat and it gurgled back to a semblence of calmness. ‘Pellia, she found the jar, then they showed up.’
‘They?’ Tacca’s eyes moved to the door and back once more.
‘The Lieutenant and the Aud-’ His stomach kicked again, this time curling him over slightly and bringing a grimace to his face. He drooled a stream of thick, brown slime onto the floor before him. He looked at it quizzically for a moment. His head nodded once more.
A strong, rough hand landed on Pica’s shoulder and steadied him. He moaned and cursed Rusa and Alces for buying bad chicken that morning. He thought he was going to vomit and looked about unsteadily for something to catch and house his coming sick, one appeared at his feet.
‘The townsfolk…’ he groaned, ‘who killed them? And the rats, what happened to the rats to do that to them?’
His questions went unanswered and for a moment he wondered if he was alone in the room. His voice floated away; he tried to focus on the nails embedded in the planking of the table. The pain in his stomach clouded his eyes with tears and he turned to the table for tea to relax his tightened throat. He was disappointed to find it gone, replaced by a small glass of gold that flickered to him invitingly. He considered it, then noticed the paper was gone as well; he wondered where he had put it and patted his breast pocket halfheartedly.
A shadow across the hearth drew his attention and his eyes focused on Lieutenant Strozzi as he seated himself before it and across the table, moving the chair back to make more room for his large frame. The young soldier's eyes went wide as he suddenly percieved the hulking officer.
Tacca handed the Lieutenant the bottle she had just poured and he took it wordlessly, swirling and holding it before the firelight to appreciate the dancing of the aureate liquid inside. She had measured herself a portion of it as well and Pica stared dully as his brain raced to understand the rapid changes around him. Even as his mind settled onto the shimmering stillness in the cup, the glow it emanated faded slightly, furthering the impression of solid gold which just so happened to shift about like water. Or maybe hot syrup, Pica considered as he watched the bottle and the way it clung to the glass stubbornly. Suspended flecks and speckles were exaggerated as they spread through the thinning liquid which imprisoned them. The result was mesmeric for all, but especially for the suddenly very tired Pica.
‘The Nectar of King Pyres,’ Lieutenant Strozzi’s voice, ever gruff but now also soft as if calming a distraught lamb, drifted across the small space between them all, ‘fortified acerglyn from the elfin folk of Arlo. It helps with the memories. The good and the bad.’
Pica looked between them both. He was conscious that he should maybe be worried, but for some reason he simply wasn’t. Couldn’t be. The lies he had wanted to tell felt pointless and ill-considered in hindsight, and he wondered what punishment would come from the mistruths he had told, both in deed and by omission. The Lieutenant shook his head at the unasked question as Pica’s eyes found him once more, instead lifting the bottle and offering a silent toast to his subordinates. They mirrored it solemnly.
The amount in the glass was less than he expected. Just enough to coat his tongue, the velvety liquid clung like honey to his mouth before its subtle, spicy, sweetness swelled into a roaring heat that soon overwhelmed all other sensations. It poured from his nose as his breath was suddenly expelled from him like flame, the tonic gripping his lungs fiercely and freezing them for a few terrifying moments. The room itself turned golden before Pica as it seemed to infect his eyes, as if the flush creeping from his neck and over his cheeks was the liquor itself and it now flooded over his eyes at it reached them.
The prior weeks tumbled behind the golden blinders, every moment of the last month, from the endless, cold nights in the thickly forested foothills of the Aurums, to the cries of the dying on the streets of Cerasus, to the jarring of his mending leg as they rode back to garrison, all was drawn before him in an instant as his mind collapsed upon itself in a kaleidoscopic, gilded remembering of traumas of every variance and disposition.
The light-haired woman who had pounced upon him to protect the three equally-blonde boys in red-and-gold armbands, their forms scrambling through the armory door behind her, ducking under black-eyed soldiers swinging even darker iron at their necks and backs as they fled. Her eyes had flashed and flared as they sparred in the early-morning sun, the terror, deep betrayal, and midnight sorrow he saw there as she battered her heavy hammer through his defenses, a sow protecting her cubs until the ultimate end.
Pica felt his soul as it rent a bit more under his probing thoughts. But the questions and implications, the dreadful doubt that wrenched him awake in horror and bastardly feelings, they were softer now. As if submerged in a blacksmith’s crucible, all was washed in a heavy blanket of hot, golden reconciliation; his queries became no more than the passing flights of an errant mind, fears and misgivings which feathered away gently, leaving only assurance in body and mind.
He was in his bed, a shimmering tingle flooding him and an invitingly scratchy blanket floating down from above. For the first time in an unknowable number of days, his body relaxed. He was extremely tired. He deserved to rest his eyes. He deserved to forget, and so he did.
Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed!
If you can, please consider donating a few dollars to support my work.
If not, no big deal,
It’s your choice and this is free for you!
