Book 4, Chapter 36: After-school Special
The days passed as we marched, and in turn we passed across many valleys and streams, over many hills, by forests, ever on the edge where the land was dry. During the day, the air was filled with the scents of a new spring, the new growth of grasses and leaves, the sweet honey scents of flowers and, from time to time in the valleys, the acrid smells of pondwater. It was almost a fuzzy smell, fuzzy green, but thinking this, I wondered if I had sensory perception issues.
We came at last to the plains of the Barclay duchy. Flat and rich, Brundle had explained, the great wheat producers of the kingdom. Where their wealth came from, so great that it supported the largest population of the duchies and the powerful church of the Seclazrin that so adamantly threatened my existence.
We were eating dinner, the midday meal, under a cloudless sky. My olive skin was darkening during this long ride. Etienne had joined us.
“Tomorrow,” Brundle said, “we’ll be within reach of the castle. They will likely be aware of our army by then.”
“It’s not like they weren’t expecting us,” said Morry.
“But not this soon, I hope.”
“We should have surprise on our side, Princess. Though they will field an army and attempt to determine the battleground. In fact, we want them to leave their castle and village.”
“My lady,” started Brundle, “I know you designed this army for speed, to catch the enemy unprepared. However, two things are worth considering. First, your aim here is to bring this wayward duchy back into the kingdom. So, you may want to avoid the unnecessary loss of life that attacking an unprepared army may bring. And the subsequent resentment, which they will hold onto.”
“I see. And second?”
“They will in all likelihood request to speak with you before the battle.”
“Right. Ok. With luck, I’ll persuade the young duke to retake his oaths and join us against the invaders. But we control the magical advantage, yes? How difficult will it be to counter their priests quickly? Can our mages contain their military through peaceful means?” With battle imminent, and this sounds so foolish, I wanted to avoid the actual fighting and killing, have them just come to their senses, drop all their sexist nonsense, sign back up into the kingdom with renewed oaths. Hell, they could keep the gold they stole from me. Everyone’s happy, then we go after the invaders. The real bad guys. The Ketzillians.
“It’s not that simple,” Etienne said, looking at me.
“Alright.”
“Their priests can counter our magic.”
“So I’ve been told, but that’s not what I specifically mean. Can you, I don’t know, make them all happy with us?”
“No, Your Highness. Our magic is destructive in nature.”
“Ah. What about the priest’s magic? Can they, if they have more priests than we have mages, will they control the magical advantage?”
“Not as such, no. Their magic is more defensive or perhaps subtractive in the sense that it negates ours. Magic will play a limited role in this battle. At least, at the beginning. If you can get to the priests, and can distract them, you will give us the magical advantage and the battle will be over.”
“But that’ll mean using magic to mass kill their soldiers.”
“Only until they surrender.”
“I don’t like it.” I held my hands up, “I can’t accept that. Burning thousands of men alive at once is repugnant and immoral.”
“Well,” Brundle said, “if we can get to their priests, we will have crushed their army and the battle will be over.”
“What do you mean?”
“They’ll have plenty of troops protecting their priests. By the time we break through to them, if we can do that, I can’t see them holding out much longer after.”
“Ah,” I said, “we do have those war rhinos.”
Morry raised his eyebrow but said nothing.
Brundle looked serious and slightly unhappy, saying, “Princess, if you are given the chance to talk with the duke, perhaps you can get him to listen to reason and give you an oath. That’s our best hope to avoiding the fighting.”
“That would be the best outcome, agreed. I will do my utmost.” On the other hand, sending forty war rhinos into a bunch of not nice priests was definitely appealing.
***
My generals and majors off to ready their men, arrange our forces in the formation Brundle wanted our army to take on the battlefield. Though we marched divided by regiment, it took some rearranging and discussion with the individual commanders, down to company leaders, to achieve Brundle’s goals. So, I found myself alone for the first time in a while.
That took a bit of doing, though. Morry insisted guards stayed with me. But Morry had to go with Brundle and the guards had to listen to me. I gave them ale and wine, ordered them to watch Cloud and the fire – don’t burn down the forest, guys – and headed off to a clearing. To train with my greatsword, wearing my full plate.
Sword fighting in plate mail is different than in chain, and much different than in clothing. Everything’s heavier for one thing, and your range of motion is decreased. The strikes had to be strong and true, kill attacks each one, as little effort as possible spent on defense. Instead of the heavy riposte of Olympic swordplay, or the outright sword on sword smashing of movies, defense was about deflection. The enemy’s sword coming down toward you, extend your blade into its motion, but not to fight the enemy’s power. Slightly tapping the blade mid-swing was enough. One merely needed to disrupt the attack, not stop the opponent’s motion completely. It’d miss its mark and glance off the armor. If you did it right.
I practiced this over and over, along with foot motions, so intently I didn’t hear him walk up to me, but saw him watching as I pivoted. Stopping, sighing, I lifted my visor. “Maitlan. How are you today?”
“Cayce, I came to talk to you about the other night.”
“Don’t you have soldiers to organize?”
“I saw Brundle first thing. We’re only 3000 strong, it was a simple matter.”
“I see.”
“Every time I see you in this armor, I’m, well, you look astonishing.”
Left hand on my hip, annoyed face, “Maitlan.”
“I . . .” he closed the distance between us, but I didn’t sheathe my sword, not wanting to give him hands to hold, “I care for you deeply.”
“No, you don’t. I’m just the only girl here.”
“You feel it too! Our kiss-”
“We were drunk. It was an emotional day. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have, I should have just held you.”
“You didn’t because you couldn’t. Cayce . . .” He came closer.
I backed up. Tilted my head, gave him the look. “It was the whiskey. I am not interested. We are not having a relationship.”
“I followed you, that night. Worried for your safety. I saw. What you did. You are a mage.”
I closed my eyes. “Damn.”
He took that moment to put his hands on my shoulders, perhaps preparing for an embrace. I pivoted, pushing his arms off, sheathing the sword and walked away. The problem with people, though, is that they can follow you. And he did. “Where are you going?”
“I don’t know. Just stop.” I wheeled around, tossing my helmet on the ground, “What do you want, Maitlan? You can’t have me. You can’t! And now you know how dangerous I am. You’re putting your life in danger just by being near me!”
“Now I know why you spend so much time alone. Hiding from everyone. You don’t have to be afraid of me. I’m here for you.”
“I don’t fear you. I fear for you, you moron. The wizards, once they find out, you think they’ll let anyone who knows live? After they kill me, I mean. Seriously, it’s better for both of us if you ignore what you saw and leave me alone. Ok? Now you know a little. You don’t know the whole, you don’t know me.”
“I can, though. If you give me the chance. You need a confidant.”
“You mean a lover.”
“Cayce, I-”
“You’re just a boy! What the hell do you know about anything? God, you have no idea.” I poked my finger into his chest, about to tell him how much older I was than he, how I’d lived a life before him, but somehow I caught myself and closed my eyes, forcing myself to calm down the same way I controlled my magic, but for these damned teenage hormones, “Please go. Please, if you care for me, let me be, leave me alone.”
He put his arms around me, a hug, and I placed my hand on his chest thinking to blast him, this annoyance, this creature pestering me – me! – the energy blooming around my hand, my eyes wide at what I was about to do, and so I let it go and slipped my arms around him, buried my head into his chest, trying not to shudder and cry at the horror of myself, and whispered, “I was going to kill you there. Jesus.”
“You wouldn’t. I trust you.”
I marshaled myself, ceased my embrace, put my hands on his chest and pushed. He didn’t fly or fall, as I didn’t use magic or trip him, and he had the decency to back up. “Seriously, Maitlan, stop. I realize you’re grieving and I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt here, but I said stop. Do I really need to have guards around me, just to keep you away?”
He took a step toward me, “Cayce, let’s just talk. You’re always so alone, but you don’t need to be. You can talk to me about this.”
“If you can’t respect my rejection, guards it is.” I thought about blasting a tree, showing him the awesome power at my fingertips, but I was too appalled at what I’d almost done, the awfulness growing within me, that had touched me too many times now, or say something mean about his dead brother, but that seemed straight out of some dumb after-school special, so I went with deceptive and bitchy instead, straight out of some other dumb after-school special. Picked up my helmet first, though.
I took his arm in mine, started walking back to my tents. “Well? How will you help me?”
“Uh, I, well I thought we could spend some time together, talk.”
“I see. What would you like to talk about?” Getting closer to the camp, just around one more bend.
“Well, were you raised a mage?”
“Nope.” Could barely hear the guards’ laughter now.
“No?”
“Nope.” Coming around the corner.
“How’d you, where’d you get the magic from then?”
And there they were. I wrenched myself out of his arm over-dramatically and yelled, “Get away from me! Can’t you let me go? Guards, help!”
Three of them leapt from their chairs and rushed over, the fourth taking a little more time, probably had too much, too quickly. One shouted, “Unhand the princess!” as he ran over.
“Cayce! What are you doing?” shouted Maitlan.
One of the guards got bodily in front of me, the other two going after the young earl. Backing up, he dodged one’s attempt to grab him. The late guy came in at a straight run, going for the tackle, and Maitlan bolted out of here, leaving the drunk guard to slide along the grass.
“Your Highness, are you ok?” asked the one in front of me. “Shall we capture that man?”
“Much better, thank you. Ah, chase him away and don’t, you know, don’t break him. He is the Earl Yohstone.”
“Ma’am.”
He gave orders, three of them chased after Maitlan, and this guy escorted me back to the fire. Pleased with myself, feeling decisively nasty, I poured him a drink.
“Did he harm you, my lady?”
“He wouldn’t leave me alone to practice.”
“He didn’t molest you, then?”
“Only with his words. Thank you for getting me out of that situation.”
“Ma’am.”
I poured myself a drink. Held it up. “Cheers. I’m going to rinse away the teenage boy essence lingering on my person.”
“Ma’am.”
Yeah, this guard wasn’t a talker. I took my ale over to a table, pulled out my sword and began oiling it. I didn’t want to talk anymore, anyways. I hummed some ancient movie theme, happily alone.
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