The Grand Crusade (15 page)

The possibility of an Aurolani force lurking on the Crozt peninsula was but one of many things weighing on his mind. Foremost among them was the political situation brewing in Narriz. Adrogans smiled, recalling Phfas’ saying that politics was not brewing but festering. He couldn’t disagree, but the methods he had for lancing that boil were limited.

His game of asking for clarifications had only bought him a couple of days. His denial of possessing dragonels had not been accepted by the crowns. His allied commanders all brought to him messages from their leaders requesting clarification of his denials. Like General Caro, they replied that Adrogans did not have them; but politicians are naturally suspicious, so requests kept coming.

At least the way they are worded becomes more inventive and entertaining.

The crowns clearly feared his taking the dragonels and building an empire. It fueled renewed requests that he leave immediately for Narriz. That would remove him as the head of his army and lessen the threat he represented. As a result he was under a direct command to quit Svarskya within a day to begin his journey.

He turned from the map and looked at his advisors. “In Narriz the situation as they see it is simple: the Aurolani have quit Okrannel, we have dragonels and are about to take over the world. This makes us a bigger threat to them than Chytrine, even though she’s far closer to Narriz than we are.”

Turpus Caro clutched scarred hands around a tankard of steaming mulled wine. “King Augustus does not feel that way. I would guess none of the leaders who are facing her assaults directly see us that way, either. It’s the western nations who fear us. Their efforts in the east are minimal, but if their fear makes them turn on Jerana, you would have no choice but to move south and create the empire they think you intend to create.”

“A self-fulfilling prophecy, yes.” Adrogans nodded slowly, then looked at the raven-haired elf. “Mistress Gilthalarwin, what do your leaders say in this matter?”

She shook her head. “We have no one in Narriz. I have sent discreet reports back to Loquellyn, but I have received no reply. My leaders know we will not assist you in empire building, so the matter is a distraction they deem beneath their notice.”

Adrogans accepted her words for their meaning, but the tightness in her voice suggested something was wrong. He’d not been privy to her messages back to Loquellyn in the past, nor had he known the frequency of her communication with her home. The fact that she’d mentioned not hearing back he took as significant, but had no idea what it might indicate.

Beal mot Tsuvo had been seated in a tall, thronelike chair. “You have liberated Svarskya. The Guranin Highlanders will follow you and do what you bid. We do not fear your building an empire because the first two nations you would have to subdue would be Gurol and Valicia. Both of them contributed to Okrannel’s liberation and you would not dishonor them that way.”

She motioned with the stump of her right arm. “A thousand more Highlanders have entered Svarskya, so our forces swell.”

“I know. Thank you.” The forces he had been given to win Okrannel’s freedom had numbered six thousand. The fighting had not been nearly as hard as it should have, but casualties and weather had cost him a quarter of his force. The influx of Guranin volunteers and a thousand refugees from the lost city ofSvoinhad more than reinforced his army.

This influx of people did augment his army nicely, but did not represent the whole of his reinforcements. More Zhusk came to the city, and while they appeared, like Phfas, to be feral creatures, they possessed great power. The Zhusk allied themselves with elemental spirits calledyrun. Phfas’ union with air allowed him to perform miracles such as stopping an arrow in flight, or triggering an avalanche. Phfas’ spiritual power mocked his tiny physical form, but he and the other Zhusk were invaluable to the army in too many ways to enumerate.

Adrogans himself knew theyrunwell, for he was half Zhusk. Before the battle for Svoin he had undergone the rituals that bound him to theyrunand vice versa. He had some command of air, earth, water, fire, and wood, but his mistress was theyrunof Pain. Even as he stood there, he could feel her clutching him loverlike from behind, her talons sinking into his shoulders and her razor teeth gnawing at his neck.

But that was a small price to pay for what she gave him. Pain luxuriated in the misery of others, and through her he could feel it as well. When he pushed his awareness through her and into Crozt, he sought the sort of discomfort armies know on the march and felt nothing. It heartened him, but did not make him believe the Aurolani had abandoned Okrannel.

“As you all know, I have been ordered to leave Svarskya for Narriz at this time tomorrow. The only caveat to the order is that, in my judgment, the situation here has to be stable.”

Caro shook his head. “Under no circumstances is it stable.”

The Jeranese general smiled, but held up a hand. “I appreciate your enthusiasm, and I agree with your assessment, though I think you are defining instability a bit more broadly than our masters are.”

The white-haired man shook his head. “To combat foolishness, I would declare the situation unstable were there nothing more sinister than snow drifting in the streets, but that is not what prompts me to make my declaration. Captain Agitare has reported that they have hit upon a good formulation for firedirt. He wants to refine it, but he is getting power equivalent to that of the Aurolani firedirt.”

Beal glanced over at him. “Why refine?”

“The firedirt the Aurolani left behind does not appear, according to what he and others can recollect, to have the power of the firedirt used at Fortress Draconis.”

“Of course!” Adrogans clapped his hands. “She did leave us the dragonels, but gave us inferior firedirt. It wouldn’t matter when we chose to use the weapons against others who didn’t have them, but matched up against her dragonels, we would deploy too close and be smashed. That’s why she felt safe in doing that.”

The Alcidese leader nodded. “And the dragonels she would recover after a battle, thanking us for dragging them along. She thought this out.”

Phfas hissed. “Nefrai-kesh did this.”

“True, Uncle, very true.” Pain clawed down Adrogans’ chest, then raked her talons across his belly. Even if the goal of the Okrannel campaign for Chytrine had been to give him underpowered dragonels, inflicting more damage on the army that won them would not make them any less effective. In fact, had his army been more chewed up, his reliance on them would have been far greater in anything he did in the future. Nefrai-kesh, however, had refrained from doing maximum damage to the army, for reasons Adrogans felt would never be made clear.

Caro set his tankard down. “Because we have uncovered her deception in this area, we have to assume it was meant to lull us into a false sense of security. We have to guard against immediate attack. For all we know there is a fleet departing the Ghost March right now, or leaving Vorquellyn or even Muroso, headed in this direction. Moreover, if Chytrine has agents in Narriz, she could already be aware of the orders that summon you there. She could target you for

assassination or, worse yet, capture and convert you into one of hersullanciri. For you to follow the orders you have been given would seriously jeopardize the war against Chytrine.“

Adrogans nodded in agreement. “All of us here—not just in this room, but in this city—realize we have a duty. Our mission was to take Okrannel from Chytrine, but that was because it would hurt her efforts at making war in the east. We still need to press her and cause her more problems. In a grand sense, the situation hereisstable, and it is up to us to make it unstable.

“Our options here are very limited. Regardless of my refusal to travel by water, we have not enough ships to move a significant portion of our forces anywhere. If we are to do anything, it will be by land. Logically, we should go into the Crozt region and secure it, which effectively wastes my army since the terrain there would allow small Aurolani units to keep us tied up for a long time. Those same units would be too small to lay siege to a reinforced Svarskya, especially if we have dragonels to discourage them.”

Beal nodded. “If we reinforce the old city’s walls, a garrison of a thousand should be enough to hold it against five times that number.”

“Agreed, and that is the project I want you to devote yourself to. Until your arm and leg are prepared, you’re not going anywhere, and the best of the new troops we have are your clansmen, so the repair and defense of Svarskya are now your responsibility.”

“Thank you, General.”

“Don’t. It will be a thankless task. At the worst Chytrine will send a dragon to melt the city and you’ll all die. At best, you’ll die of boredom. The fact is, however, I need someone I can trust to do this. You’ll also have Svoin volunteers and the Okrans Kingsmen to help you. Any other refugees flooding in will be trained and you can release better units to join us.”

Caro sipped his wine, then smiled. “Join us where?”

Adrogans sighed. “The war in the east consists of a strong push south and now southwest. Saporicia is going to become the battleground because King Augustus cannot afford to wait for Chytrine to get south. If you look at the Narriz harbor and draw a line east to Bokagul, you have the line Augustus must defend. The mountains and the ocean secure his flanks.”

The elf frowned. “This suggests you think Oriosa will hold against her and not just let her troops wander through.”

“Augustus has to think that, too. We know that because he’s not yet invaded Oriosa. He’ll have forces on the border to screen against that possibility, and Oriosa has to hold or become a battleground itself. King Scrainwood may be a cowardly snake, but he does have a sense of self-preservation.”

Adrogans turned to the map again and the others gathered around, with the elf supporting Beal mot Tsuvo. “So, we have to guess at what Chytrine and Nefrai-kesh will do. Something you said, Turpus, about a fleet gathering in the Ghost March or on Vorquellyn makes me wonder. The conquest of Vorquellyn

was the greatest seaborne invasion the world has known and was wildly successful. Chytrine attempted to duplicate that feat with the invasion of Vilwan. Its failure has undoubtedly led people to believe she is not going to use the sea anymore. Many would point to the fact that we shipped troops here for this campaign without opposition as proof that shecannotrule the sea.“

The Zhusk shaman snorted. “She wanted us here.”

“Exactly, so there was no reason she would harass us at sea. This is not to say she could not have done so, but that she chose not to do so. And remember that Nefrai-kesh, when he was Lord Norrington, led a waterborne invasion of Okrannel and did win a victory on the sea. He’s not afraid of shipping troops.”

Turpus set his tankard down on Valicia. “A fleet in the Ghost March could land anywhere. Once the forces are locked in battle in Saporicia, the fleet could place troops behind the lines.”

Beal’s blue eyes became slits. “You’re thinking tactically. Think politically.” She tapped her index finger on a spot further south. “The Aurolani will sail down and take Yslin.”

Her words came in a hoarse whisper that filled Adrogans’ belly with ice, and Pain delighted in it. A strike at Yslin would cut allied forces off from their reinforcements by land. Oriosa would no longer be threatened by Augustus, so it could go fully over to the Aurolani camp. Alcida would fall and other nations would follow. Chytrine would conquer them, or they would bargain with her as Scrainwood had.

Blood had drained from Caro’s face. “Do you honestly think she has a fleet gathering in the Ghost March?”

“It’s immaterial. She did not lose all of her ships in the Vilwan invasion, and she is using ships to supply troops in Muroso. We can and should assume they are shipping from the Ghost March. What I suggest we have to do is to move the bulk of our forces up and around into the Ghost March. We disrupt whatever she is doing there. If she is preparing an invasion of Yslin, we do our best to stop it. If all she is doing is running supplies, we stop them.”

Caro nodded slowly. “We really can’t tell the crowns of our suspicions about the Yslin invasion, can we?”

“No.” Adrogans shook his head. “It’s like the dragonels: it’s a problem they cannot deal with. If they plan against it, Chytrine punches down through weakened lines and it doesn’t matter. Some nations will assume that Yslin isn’t the target, but that their own nation is, and they will stop giving troops and supplies, so the effort against her fails.”

Gilthalarwin raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you fear the fleet might sail up the river to Lakaslin and destroy Jerana?”

“As much as you fear it might land at Rellaence and destroy your home.” Adrogans sighed. “Being there to stop Chytrine from attacking Jerana or Loquellyn or Yslin will not defeat Chytrine. Only one thing will. Just as she can strike at our homes and make us fear, we can do the same. With every mile we

stab into the Ghost March, she has to worry about our turning north and bring ing war to Aurolan. The leaders down south won’t see it that way, so we must see it for them. We have to do what they will fail to command us to do.“

Caro’s lips tightened into a grim smile. “There are those who would consider this mutiny.”

“Yes, but they are the ones who wear the crowns.” Adrogans forced a brave smile on his face. “We’re the ones who shed blood for the crowns and, at least this time, that makes for all the difference in the world.”

Alexia looked up from her place in the chair beside the fire as Crow entered their chambers. “Snowing again, is it?” He nodded, shrugged off a heavy cloak, the shoulders of which had been dappled by snow, “Not very much, but it’s coming from the north, just like Chytrine’s forces will.” Crow glanced at the small table beside her and the sheaf of paper stacked there. “You read what I wrote today?”

“I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, not at all.” He frowned. “There were things I’d not thought on for a long time. That’s why I went for a walk, and I guess I was out longer than I thought.”

The hesitation in his voice rasped against her heart. “I didn’t realize that you and Seethe