Castrum Cerasus – Mustering
The Order of Inquisitors almost predates the establishment of the Six Sister Citadels themselves. Housed in the Third Tower of Avium for millennia, these figures have been central to essentially every aspect of the Grove Protectorate, both domestic and foreign, since Founding Day.
Their primary focus is intelligence-gathering and propaganda-dissemination throughout the empire, the Inquisitors acting as a national investigatory body and ensuring the ongoing peace and wellbeing of the citizens of the Protectorate. The ‘Black Cloaks’ are, unsurprisingly therefore, not without controversy and a horde of conspiracy follows in their wake like their already poisonous shadow.
Among a few more notable rumors, it is alleged that Protector Buteo, 14th of that role, was assassinated at the hands of the organization, thereby ending their brief, brutal tenure as Dux Primus of the empire. This has never been confirmed for any number of reasons: primarily, Buteo’s remains were found floating 150-miles north of the citadel in the Ochre Bay, the cause of death (investigated and recorded by a bipartisan council of the Order of Inquisitors and Maesters Guild) being unknowable due to the many injuries that the infinite number of sharp rocks that fill that formidable cove could have caused at any point before the body was recovered. How the most powerful figure and spiritual head of the Grove ended up floating out there is technically still a mystery, but the most accepted explanation is that they fell, drunken, from the cliffs of Avium and were pulled northward into the cove by strong coastal currents.
In the end, there were no direct witnesses to the Protector’s demise, nor were any reasons given by the staff of the Protectorate’s Keep for how they ended up alone on the west balcony that towered off the cliffs and over the churning shores of the Grey Sea. In fact, the closest household servants’ memories are reported as ‘foggy’ and ‘questionable’ with many claiming they had not seen the Protector for days despite assisting in the most mundane and intimate aspects of daily life in the Keep. More unusual still was the death of the entire household to some unknown malady within a month, followed by a fire of unusual ferocity that stripped the Keep of its libraries and the vast majority of the living chambers within.
Rumors have naturally run wild since that time, and it is fair to say that they have only gotten wilder with repeated tellings across generations. Some less-reputable sources speak of what they call Inquisitor ‘Takers’ filling the streets and scooping up witnesses following the inferno while others seem to remember ‘wizards’ shooting flames of purple, green, and blue from the towers surrounding the Keep. It is hard to not dismiss these extravagant tales as mere bald fantasy!
It is noteworthy that while fewer than ten official documents from the time remain within the tower libraries, these records of our own unassailable maesters of Avium suggest no wild occurrences at all; nor do the records of their fellows in any of the Sister Citadels, nor anywhere else I have thus far traveled, suggest that any such events as told in the seedier corners of the empire could have occurred.
-Excerpt from Orders of the Grove Protectorate, Their History, & Collected Rumors
The Mellivora battle standard flew high and proud above Cerasus’ northern gate. It was a weighty thing, bulky in both material and history and near impossible for even a strong wind to make more than flutter on its thick, oaken mast. The Badger insignia of the Company crouched defensively across the fabric, head hung low, and fangs bared ferociously. A broad white stripe ran from the tip of its nose to its hindquarters, widening further where it ran down the animal’s slick back and emphasized sharply by the creature’s flaring maroon eyes. Along the bottom of the lax standard, a rainbow of cloth tatters taken from the banners of fallen adversaries had been braided into the material itself in a varicolored trail that stretched almost the entirety of the perimeter of the great flag; among them, some of the most historically renowned fighting forces in history were shamefully represented in a beautiful plait and someday soon, it seemed, a stripe of Onari red-and-gold would be joining the others forever frozen there.
The cloth twitched under an insistent breeze and a bored horse, serving as a convenient marker as Sergeant Tacca led Simen, Pica, and Pellia to muster just beyond the gate. As always after a battle, they collectively strove to ignore the still-growing pile of bodies the medics and soldiers continued to lay out precisely beside one another. Nobody could ever not look at them really, but you had to try nonetheless if it was an option. You sure as hell didn’t speak about it.
This would be the last stop for those frightful Auditors, their final tally of the Company’s action in the town. After they had finished surveying and investigating the battlefield, they would congregate here to examine the remains of the dead, painstakingly studying each corpse for distinctive markings like piercings or tattoos, recent injuries, or notable scars, as well as any sort of documentation, personal or otherwise, that may be of value. Any of these could be crucial in some aspect of the spiderweb of the Protector’s wars on the frontier, and any soldier so misfortunate as to be found particularly noteworthy was soon granted the dubious honor of eternal remembrance in the black records of the Inquisitors’ Tower, a death mask of them crafted precisely in terra alba and removed alongside their heads in the dank cells of a morbid dissector or collector of cadavers therein.
Fourth Squad were headed to a farmhouse just a quarter-mile from the north gate of the town where it had been decided that Fourth Platoon would be staying for the coming week and until the remainder of the Company arrived from the north. It was one of three such buildings which had been appropriated by the soldiers and now formed the beginnings of a small field fort growing off the north end of Cerasus like a limpet. For now, there was just a cluster of three buildings which were to be rapidly converted into two barracks and a quartermaster’s store with an encompassing periphery ditch and embankment walls. Pica wondered which jobs they would be assigned after such a lively morning. Latrines probably.
As Tacca expected, they found Alces, Rusa, and Silybum sat with the ever-silent Scribe on the broad porch of the building they would be housing in. The Triplets munched merrily on black bread, sweet butter, and blackstrap molasses, all likely pilfered from a cabinet within the house or a rebel pack lost in hasty retreat through the twisting streets. They jostled each other with elbows and shoulders, making jokes as they enjoyed the simplicity and general calm that follows the chaos of combat. They quieted down substantially as the Sergeant arrived with her other three pups in tow, stifling giggles as they saw Pica’s beaten form struggle tiredly up the shallow steps.
The youngest of seven total children of a well-to-do merchant and her horse breeder husband, the Triplets had been born and raised in the flourishing Populus town of Tremula to the east. The privilege that accompanied such a raising was clear in their holding as well as their manicured accents, their attitudes and perspectives often colored by the carelessness common to upbringings with largely only superficial suffering. They were lively, outgoing, and intensely interdependent since childhood, sticking together in every type of mischief and always to be found at the center of whatever ruckus arose in the household. When they had turned sixteen, they had set off west together in search of adventure; their parents, well-supplied in heirs and labor by the remaining, less-troublesome siblings, gave their blessings and appreciated some long-awaited quiet to manage their respective empires.
Alces and Rusa were near enough to identical to make little difference; both stocky with thickly muscled arms and broad chests, their golden-ivory faces jolly and red-cheeked as they laughed. Both had large blue eyes and wild, twisting honey-gold hair that they kept well-oiled, Alces wearing his in a tight knot while Rusa preferred a long warrior’s tail. They always seemed to be in the middle of some joke, one holding in laughter while the other pantomimed or finished a rude punchline.
Like Tacca, Rusa had taken to the battle axe upon enlistment and had shown himself to be more than proficient in the close, heavy, unwieldy combat that those weapons demanded of their users. Alces, alternatively, elected the zweihänder, the weapon their father had used during his long tenure in the Alba Guard and one which Alces could swing and twirl into an impenetrable wall on the field. They fought side-by-side, mirroring one another’s moves in near-perfect symmetry and scaring everyone around them, friend or foe, near to death in the process. Despite their size, or perhaps because of it, they could twist their large blades with a dazzling speed and efficiency as if dancing a waltz rather than hewing through ranks of enemy troops.
In contrast to her hulking brothers, Silybum, was a slight woman with a muscular frame that suggested much time spent climbing, wrestling, and sprinting for enjoyment rather than purpose. She was a runner by nature and by far the fastest in the company, often seen flying from place to place on the battlefield transmitting messages and taking the quick shot with the compact recurve bow she wore on her back. As any good Populan archer should traditionally be, she was equally proficient with the weapon from horseback, able to nock and loose a barrage of arrows nearly 80 yards with deadly accuracy while gripping her mount tightly with only her knees. It was a skill well-honed from years training stocky Hessians and chestnut Trakehner for use in the long-ranging hunts across the river plains the nobility of the region and Alba Citadel found so enjoyable. She missed those days and talked of them often, the long days at her father’s side as they broke in their stock on the ranging flatland stretching from the Aurum foothills to the City-of-Three on the Wonnow River to the east.
Her hair was as warmly blonde as her brothers’, but where theirs was curly, hers was brutally straight, flowing smoothly to the small of her back and often rolled up for stuffing into a tight-fitting skullcap that her helmet could easily slip over. Despite her efforts at restraining the luxuriant mass, it often found itself cascading in her eyes and mouth when she most needed to climb a tree, hunt game, or roughhouse one of the men who dared get a bit too fresh for her liking. She liked to threaten to cut it off, cursing the Gods and sun alike for the burden it caused, but she never did.
She stood next to The Company’s scribe as she slathered warm butter on a final chunk of sour rye and chewed it noisily, peering over his bony shoulder while he sketched the mustering grounds unperturbed. Next to nothing was known about ‘Scribe,’ not even his given name. He was, as required by Grove law, a university-trained and officially embedded war scribe, an indispensable observer and recorder of Mellivora’s actions for imperial posterity and review back in Avium. When exactly he had arrived was a source of much late-night debate among the soldiers; those willing to speak on it never being quite sure of when they first saw him and the only records available being written by the man himself and tucked away in some Keeptown library.
He had a long, thin face that was of an indeterminate age and kept immaculately hair-free; bets among the company ranged from twenty-five to more than forty, but no evidence of any sort had ever been provided one way or other. It seemed unlikely that anyone would find out regardless as Scribe, having chosen a path of silence in his studies, didn’t talk much either. In fact, nobody was sure whether they had ever actually heard him speak, though his scowl and sad, sage-green eyes seemed to say plenty when they locked on you from across a dark room or smoky battlefield.
His attire matched his dour demeanor and did not the rest of the Company’s at all; beside the slate-and-rose badger insignia he wore prominently on a leather disc hanging from his neck to mark his assignment, he was draped from head-to-toe in the loose-fitting grey robes common among scribes of any persuasion. He kept his long, ink-splattered sleeves rolled above his elbows and bound there with small, purpose-sewn buttons; on his belt, and alongside the chain that bound his tome to his person, were a series of pouches in which he stored all the essential implements of his trade from colored inks and their composite ingredients to freshly sharpened quill tips, binding glue, and all manner of horrendously sharp knives and scalpels for the manufacture of brushes. Alongside the instruments of the scribe, he also carried those of the soldier, stowing a wickedly long, curved blade in an understated sheath on his left hip that he was more than capable of wielding in a pinch.
As an observer primarily, he avoided most direct combat when possible and would usually secure himself an elevated position from where he could monitor and illustrate all in rapid, detailed strokes. When the company was not in combat, he spent most of his time writing in his book regardless, filling a multitude sheafs with his general observations, painstakingly accurate illustrations, and minute-by-minute accounts of the company’s daily work and drudgery in the field. Upon completion of one, he would detach it from his chain and meticulously carve the date of completion into the spine, carefully wrapping it in soft linen cloth for sending to Avium for review and replication by the Scribes and Maesters there. He would then produce another, identical book from some unknown stockpile, painstakingly engraving the date-of-start in the spine and beginning all over again with the click of a lock. The amount of those things he had filled and posted over the years was another of the many mysteries surrounding the strange, silent man.
Despite his oddity and the way in which he made others generally uncomfortable, he had found a friend in Sily who, whether he wanted her to or not, would often find a way to sit beside him at the night’s fire and could always be found near him on the battlefield, plinking away with her bow from whatever perch he had claimed for himself, when she wasn’t required elsewhere. They made unorthodox friends; her quietly cooing over his beautiful, devilishly accurate illustrations, and him oblivious of her with a determinedness that would have made one think he was blind had the possibility not been preposterous. If one looked closely enough, they may have noticed that in all the portraits he drew, there were slightly more that featured the beautiful young woman competing with his shadow, that these drawings were almost always forgotten discretely when he ultimately retired for the night, never included in his packaged entries to the roseate Citadel to the west.
The weather was fine and he was engaged in a charcoal sketch of the lounging brothers as they leaned bodily on the stout railing. It threatened to buckle under the combined weight of the well-fed Populan figures, and Sily and Pellia traded silent wagers on the life left in the old beam. The former was disappointed and passed the usual bet to her smaller comrade as the beam withstood the men pushing off in a rush to stand straight at a bark from Tacca.
‘Lieutenant!’
Strozzi arrived from the cobbled road that led to the small cluster of buildings, appearing around the corner of the porch just as the sergeant pivoted to address him. He dusted himself off with great swipes of a heavy cloth and spat grimly as grit found its way into his mouth. Taking advantage of a rain barrel near the porch stairs to dunk his head, he shook his head vigorously and hooted as the cold liquid crept under his armor to soak the thick cloth underneath. The drips and droplets scattered on the dirt and staircase as he clomped onto the porch to the office that surely already awaited him within.
He glanced appraisingly over Pica’s battered visage before looking to Tacca who gave him a small nod, assuring the needs of her troopers had been well-attended. He returned it with a grin and turned his attention to Scribe who was finishing his drawing by smudging the forms gently with a twisted bit of an old tortillon. ‘Eyes up, Scribe.’ The lieutenant barked, taking a cursory glance at the illustration the man was drafting on linen paper. ‘Heteractis and Third Platoon have reports to make and need the company scribe to do it. You know the drill.’
The record-keeper stood to his full height and met the officer’s wild stare with his own doleful, green one. The Lieutenant rolled his eyes at the expectation perceived therein and shirked his own responsibilities smoothly.
‘My accounts can wait, Scribe,’ Strozzi offered gruffly with a wave of a hand, ‘weren’t you there anyway?’ He pointed back the way he had come, ‘should find her in that new assayer’s office they were building on the east side of the market, the green one with the unfinished roof. That is where we will be setting up the long-term headquarters and supply once Dorylus gets here to do the heavy-lifting.’
With a snap, the book closed sharply and the silent man was, as usual, gone without a word of either understanding or affirmation, floating away as if his feet never touched the ground as he went in search of Third Platoon’s unpredictable senior officer. The sudden movement of the ever-mute Scribe startled the Lieutenant. He covered for it seamlessly with an over-dramatized leap to the side to allow the man passage, providing a laugh for most and humanizing the somewhat strange and unpleasant figure for all.
‘Knock off that jackassery!’ He spun to confront Simen and the brothers who had begun instinctively ribbing one another at the sight, ‘I am damned sure you didn’t steal that snack you’ve just shoved into your gullets.’ he barked at the brothers who were absentmindedly wiping hands across tunics. He turned his head sharply to Pica before the brothers could respond in any meaningful way beyond a brief exchange of sheepish glances.
Looking closely at the bandaging around the young man’s face and focusing on his vaguely distant eyes, he glanced at Tacca once more. ‘You sure he isn’t concussed? Did Doc do this to him, or he do it to himself? Because if he did it himself, you wouldn’t have taken him from the doctor’s care, am I right?’
Tacca, ever stone-faced before the lieutenant’s rapid-fire method of conversation, nodded sharply. ‘Yessir, Doc Pan swung by and one of his little goons gave Pica some nonsense. After the Doc pulled off a chunk of his ear that was hanging a bit… freer than usual.’
The brothers snickered to themselves as they themselves took proper note of Pica’s bandaged head for the first time, Strozzi ignored them as he leaned over slightly to peer down at the bandaged, slightly leaking, leg.
‘And that?’ he inquired with an implicatory finger. ‘Lords, this boy looks ready to join the corpse pile o’er yonder.’ He jerked his head in the direction of the bodies, now accompanied by four grey-masked auditors and twice as many of their scurrying apprentices taking notes and measuring scars or fingers.
‘Splinter, sir.’ Pica answered for himself this time, preventing Sergeant Tacca any more humor at his expense. ‘Nothing too serious, a cart caught fire near the stable, must’ve had pitch or something stored inside, just erupted as I walked by.’ He lifted his leg, bending it and managing to mostly cover his wincing in a show of his health and fitness for duty. ‘Should be right as rain, just a scratch.’
The Lieutenant, smelling a lie but not caring so long as the man could walk and laugh, just nodded gravely. To Tacca he said, ‘make sure you all rest tonight, we begin work on the curtain wall and retaining structures first light tomorrow. No extra duties for this one,’ he pointed at Pica who flushed, ‘other than maybe watch and cooking whatever is needed for watch tonight. We’ll have the doc come see him again tomorrow for further assessment of that head wound.’ He turned his attention to Pica properly. ‘No unnecessary movement,’ he reiterated, ‘I even suspect that leg is getting worse, I’ll be sending you to Pan for some time under his beloved saw, understood?’
The young soldier balked at the idea. ‘No, sir. No chance in hell I’m riding home with the wounded and dead. Not once Haida-’
He flinched at the look gone icy in the Lieutenants eyes. ‘Once Captain Haidarum arrives with our sprinters,’ Pica amended smoothly, ‘I will be able to move fine.’
‘You expect to use one of the empire’s finest distance runners for your daily chores, soldier? Is that what I’m hearing?’
A silence responded briefly as all quickly tried to determine the level of jest in their lieutenant’s question. He stood straighter and smiled minutely.
‘Stay off the leg, Pica.’
‘Sir!’ the soldier reaffirmed smartly.
‘Excellent.’
He dismissed the lot without a further word and leaned forward to poke his head over the threshold and into the house.
With a wink to Tacca that was all but imperceptible to the group at large, the Lieutenant moved forward and barked through the doorway. ‘Varanus!’
‘Sir?’
‘I rather fancy the house next door for headquarters, don’t you?’
‘Uh.’ The attendant’s voice paused before regaining its footing. ‘Sir, that is reserved for-’
‘Excellent!’
And Strozzi was back down the steps and set his eyes on the second, admittedly better constructed building. Straightening his armor crisply and striding off to inquire things of and berate the first squad unlucky enough to get anything more than his passing attention on the way.
‘Smartass’ Tacca said either to herself or Pica as she turned to the squad. ‘Well, you heard the LT, big day tomorrow. Let’s get inside and get organized. Stop that now, children’ she growled at a hint of protest from the young troopers as she shepherded them through the door.
Upon entry, the house was clearly the inferior of the two structures that could be so named on the property. Clearly having been built in times of smaller families or hardship, the need for the neighboring replacement as an alternative or addition was abruptly clear as the squad took in the tight quarters.
‘Shit,’ Sily breathed, ‘we’re gonna be stacked on each other in here. How many of us are in here?’
‘Three less now that Strozzi and his attendant officers will be gracing Heteractis and Third Platoon next door.’ Tacca answered crisply. ‘Now stop complaining, your highness, and find some space for us and our gear. Go on.’
Pica looked about as he pushed further into his new home and the faltering light gave way to the afternoon sun flooding past opening shutters. Despite what Sily said, the house had plenty of space for the thirty odd soldiers who would be sharing it over the coming days. The main room was spacious enough to ensure while those occupying it were close, a substantial loft area accessed by a set of thin stairs near the main door would ensure they weren’t sleeping atop all their gear. The ceiling, while low, was sloped gently to both capture heat while removing smoke from the main living areas; it created a cozy, if humble atmosphere of cradled light and warmth that spoke of a house well-designed and built with purpose.
The absence of life here, either animal or human, was a thing of curiosity as he looked around the admittedly well-appointed-at-one-time home. He wondered when the family who owned the property had abandoned the farmstead and where they had gone. It was clear from the construction outside that it had been occupied within at least the last few weeks and there had been no fighting here that he was aware of. Yet still, two homes and a barn sat empty outside Cerasus.
‘Pica,’ Sergeant Tacca broke his reverie, ‘you sit your mangled ass over yonder where I can keep an eye on you.’ She pointed to a stool next to the cracked hearth, indicating she intended to honor Strozzi’s command, making him responsible for the night shift maintaining the fire and pitching in the squad’s portion of the ration duties for the coming evening.
‘Simen,’ she began her usual list of camp tasks, deferring to old habit to overcome a growing sense of stiffness and fatigue settling over her troopers, ‘fetch wood and fill-up the box there. Grab extra, tonight’s gonna be a cold one despite the heat now. Pell, help out and keep an eye on him, keep him out of trouble, off intoxicants, etcetera.’
The youngest member of the squad nodded sharply and set her jaw firmly to pull the man to his tasks as bidden, earning an affectionate smile from the sergeant and a laugh from Pica as he settled unsteadily onto the low stool.
‘You three,' she addressed the Triplets, 'go see what we have left in the way of provisions. If needed, report to Heteractis’ supply sergeant up the hill or next door - no, I don’t know which - to request enough until we can do a proper sweep for supplies from the captured properties in the town.’
‘Jawohl!’ The Triplets saluted in unison before bounding away, ducking out the door into a day gone hazy with unseasonably warm heat and stubborn battle-smoke.
Dinner, despite the short supply of quality vegetables or meat available to the soldiers, was pleasant and subdued as Lieutenant Strozzi’s platoon finished their day early and sorted themselves throughout the dwelling. The Triplets’ foraging efforts had produced a brace of skinny prairie hares from the fields of barley husks nearby as well as a variety of wild milk cap mushrooms, sage, and ramsons. Alongside the ration grain that Pellia painstakingly pestled and folded with pig fat, salt, and water to make thick hearth cakes, all found themselves satiated as a bottle of something sweet and dark brown began making its way around the room. The day ground its final moments and fully settled into the introspective chrysalis of night.
The squad, finding the interior a bit oppressive with both smells and energy after the day, found themselves back on the porch outside. They enjoyed the air gone, as promised, crisp once the sun allowed the parched earth a respite for the day, breathing of the fresh breeze pouring down over the treetops to their east.
‘Shame about Xerini and Bellis,’ Sily said into the stillness. ‘Good soldiers, Fourth Platoon is certainly weaker without them.’
Tacca nodded ‘They died well though, Bellis took a sword meant for the lieutenant. She saved him today, without a doubt.’
‘I liked her a lot,’ Rusa added somberly. Alces raised his wineskin, taking a long pull before handing it to his brother who imitated the action. One by one, they all drank of the skin except for Scribe who didn’t imbibe in any manner and simply nodded commemoratively before passing the liquid on to Tacca in turn.
Simen stooped through the low doorway to join them. He carried a smoldering branch from the fire and used it to light the paper twist that hung from his mouth. ‘Any ideas about the rebel in the armor?’ he asked past the odorous spliff.
‘I was wondering about that too! Never seen one in a full uniform like that before’ Pellia chirped, excited to finally debrief and get some answers to her ever-present questions. ‘Didn’t know they came like that.’
‘A few of them in the painted leathers this time too’ Sily added.
‘I think…’ Tacca started, but paused briefly, ‘it seems to me, that Anticlea’s traitors are becoming more brazen… and organized than before.’
‘Organized?’ Pica asked, looking up from the kettle he was watching from a chair near the door. ‘That can’t be good, we have had no shortage of problems already with their ambush tactics without more planning on their parts.’
The Sergeant was grim. ‘Agreed. But those bastards in paint were Onari, not Anticlean, and finding both here together doesn’t bode well for our greater efforts.’
Sily looked thoughtfully into the fire. ‘You know, between the rebels on the North Road and those blue devils raiding Populus across the eastern border,’ she spat reflexively, ‘there seems to be a lot more ‘organized’ trouble about as of late.’
‘That is true,’ Tacca agreed, ‘can’t argue that we haven’t had our hands fuller than usual on this latest campaign. We will have to see what this rebel "officer" has to say. Suppose it might help us solve one of our problems at least.’ The sergeant went sullen and pale as she mentioned the man in red-and-gold again. ‘Doesn’t bode well though, no.’
Pica wondered what she was implying. Was the man they captured not an actual leader? He had to admit that he had looked strange in his misfitting armor, seeming to have crammed himself into it just in time to lose his fight in the market square. Would Onari officers have attendants like their Unitary counterparts? Had they simply died before finishing their service to the man?
‘Probably be in an Inquisitor dungeon somewhere by morning,’ Rusa supposed, ‘sure he’ll be wishing he had managed to get Strozzi to kill him once those grey bastards start cutting on him.’
‘I hate those… things,’ Pellia almost whispered, suddenly hyper-aware of their surroundings and glancing into the now-set darkness around them, ‘always prowling around after a battle or lurking about in camp in the middle of the night unannounced.’
Silence descended over the group as reflection, reminiscence, and no small amount of reticence inhibited their desire to engage in a discussion of the figures. They knew well the rumors that surrounded the Inquisitorial Council and their pet creeps, their proclivity for slinking through the night and disappearing the enemies of the Grove without notice or trace. The thought of the masked investigators, possibly wandering the night just outside their limited view, settled uncomfortably across the rest of the group.
Today had been another day for the troopers, a repetition of actions, thoughts, beliefs, and regrets that had visited each of them countless times over the years. As usual after an engagement at the end of a long hunt, they found themselves in a state of pause, stuck between yesterday and tomorrow, and unwilling to look either full in the face just yet. They were vigorously tired, exhausted beyond what a reasonable human would think possible and exhilarated to have the privilege to see the end of another terrifying day. They proceeded inside in a slow trickle, some to bed and some to quieter enjoyments.
Not ready for bedrolls just yet, Alces produced a pack of well-worn, chipped wooden cards and began to set up a game on a crate that Rusa found and drug closer to the light of the hearth. Pellia moved to watch them, continuing her ever-frustrating attempts to learn the game they claimed was so simple. It confused her. The rules never seemed to be the same and she was growing increasingly certain that the boys were making it up as they went. It did nothing to make it any less interesting or inhibit her engagement with the cards flying about, the rapid-fire accusations of lying and cheating between the two. The fact that Simen seemed able to compete with, and even occasionally excel above the brothers made her both more suspicious and conversely convinced her that the game must be real and originate from somewhere.
Sily stared into bright coals as the day played yet again in the mesmeric flames dancing their cherry jig. She lost herself in the shifting persimmon, tangerine, and coquelicot, her mind finally putting itself to processing the day in its entirety. She couldn’t unsee them, those eyes from the morning, almost identical to her own, full of fear and disbelief, the silently moving mouth pulling in gasping breaths and refusing to release a sound of any meaning. She recalled the phantom weight of her belt knife in her hand and the almost intangible resistance as it pulled across and through the guard’s sunbaked skin, the light leaving those eyes in the same instant the quenching sand plunged the living into darkness as well.
Pica recalled three young men. They tumbled from an open door and into the street, half-dressed and still chewing on whatever they had managed to grab on the way through the kitchen. He watched in disbelief, frozen in memory as he had been in that moment, but with much more time for introspection as he saw them cut down once again by the short, broad First Squad soldier. He groaned audibly to himself and pushed the images away alongside the sickness they brought to his gut. Instead, the woman appeared behind his closed eyelids, furious and beautiful in her rage, her hammer swinging on him with brutality and a locked grimace of hatred across her face.
They were dead, all of them, but they were here with them now as well, watching, taunting them for the inhumanity of their actions. They didn’t understand any better than he did, but what did that matter? Understanding didn’t stop steel; it didn’t stop the march or the orders or the ultimate demise of them all. He reached up and felt the lump in his breast pocket, the rich crimson cloth he had taken to tie his wound parading across his mind’s eye and matching the gaping of her crimson mouth as her life pumped from the gash in her throat.
‘Glad you aren’t dead, Pica.’ Simen interrupted the ponderous silence. He had stood from watching the brothers’ game and walked to the other side of the table unnoticed by his friend. He sat and wrapped him in thick, bronze arms, leaning forward, resting his head on the man’s shoulder and cocking his head gently to lean against his jaw. Pica stifled a sob, turning it into a half-cough and reaching up to hold Simen’s hand against his chest. He closed his eyes, leaning back slightly and relaxing into the comforting embrace.
Sily smiled warmly at the two despite the coldness still stubbornly locked in her blue eyes and not yet ready to relinquish their hold on her attentions. They soon thawed as well however as Scribe entered quietly and deposited himself to her left, turning his back slightly to get better light and so she was able watch as he sketched sleeping soldiers with a sharpened piece of leaded coal. She looked at the strange man for a moment before shuffling forward just enough to share her warmth with him, settling down to watch him work as a more contented look settled softly over her face.
The air was oppressive in its calm; despite the sounds of revelry and companionship arising from the rooms in the rear of the structure, the feeling of despair, loss, and uncertainty omnipresent. It was all a blanket, a shield from the recognition of the horrors they both received and apportioned in their daily lives. There was no sense in thinking on any of it, not really, but that does nothing to inhibit the thoughts in the end. Sure, false machismo and zeal are a surefire response to the random unfairness of death, but it is, as every soldier knows, a bandage covering a soul rent beyond repair; a faithless hope that things aren’t as bad as they seem and that there is some ‘true’ or ‘higher’ purpose to what they are repeatedly asked to do. Or the things that nobody asked them to do but which required doing nonetheless.
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