Book 4, Chapter 48: The Eternal Bridge
We had to veer around the long trench where the latrine had been. The long pit, almost a canal, still remained but no longer stank. Yet no one wanted their horse riding through whatever was hidden under the leaves and dirt that now covered it. A few shoots were making their way out of the ground. Probably, it was rich soil.
Poles still lined the old latrine. Where the men of my Companion Cavalry had been strung up to die. Crucifixion poles. I stopped Cloud, off to the side, as the army went on, to stare at them, lost in thought and memory as I was.
I couldn’t make out where our tents were and I briefly thought that if I could find the blood stain of the priest, I’d know, but shook my head to clear that. Not a thing I needed to know.
Morry parked his horse beside mine, “The encampment.”
“Yes.”
“It would have been new to you then.”
“Everything was.”
“We made it out alive. And now you have an army.”
“Yeah.” I shuddered.
“What is it?”
“A lot of bad memories. You and Tread were crucified, the duke tried to kill me in single combat, and the priest . . .”
“I corrected the duke on that account, I believe. You corrected the priest with a little more finality. Come,” Morry said, “Let’s make our way to the bridge. You’ll be seeing it with new eyes this morning.”
***
As we came to the bridge, my introduction to this strange world, I remembered an old prophecy from back home, ‘If you cross the river, a mighty empire will fall.’ Hopefully, the bad news applied to the other guys this time.
The massive size of the bridge was bewildering now as much as the first time I’d seen it. The two stone pillars rising up into the sky, each large enough to live in, holding up the long decking itself, wide enough for three horsemen to gallop abreast without worry. It had to be more than a mile long.
Yet it wasn’t long enough. The river was more full than the last time I was here, and rose past the bridge mouth, just over the bank where the encampment started. It was shallow here, tapering off to dry land. We’d either have to make a bridge to get to the larger bridge or swim to its beginning and climb up, hoping the river remained calm. Brundle and a number of mages waited on the hill before it. I rode to them.
The general said, “We’re going to have to ford this gap or build a bridge.”
“So I surmised. Which is quicker?”
“Fording it, but we will get wet and there may be accidents.”
“That doesn’t sound healthy for soldiers, to be marching in waterlogged boots.”
“It wouldn’t be.”
“Alright, let’s build a bridge. I wonder if the mages can help?”
The army broke into teams. Mages worked with infantry to move stones into the river crossing from here to the bridge while cavalry rode off to the woods to get lumber. As fast as magic can make some events happen, this was going to take time.
While they were doing that, others set up temporary cookfires, so that the army could have a hot lunch. I mean dinner. Hot, freshly cooked dinner. In this purpose, additional parties were sent hunting and fishing along the banks. It was well organized, the army having now been more or less a professional one since just before I’d arrived to this world.
I felt guilty, letting others do the work, but Brundle, Morry and I put up a, well, I don’t know what to call it. A picnic area? We set a blanket on the ground, sat on it, and let servants bring us fresh fish from the river and cold beverages. Thankfully, it was a nice, sunny day.
The contrast between us and everyone else was striking. The army was some 85 000 men strong now. All of them were doing something, moving stones, cutting down trees, though so far off, these guys were relegated to my imagination, and others catching fish to my great envy, still others well out of sight, getting game. To service so many people, the cooking area was a long, long line of fires, people, supplies lined up behind them, moving back and forth, and a line of men taking turns for breaks and eating.
And beyond that, the many, many stablehands taking care of the pack animals, which involved removing their baggage in an organized fashion so they would know where every last supply was, moving the herd along the grassy plains to eat, to the river to drink, combing their fur, and probably more I wasn’t familiar with.
Normally, this was all invisible to me, since for most of the time we were on the march and I was somewhere in the middle, fully protected. But on this grassy riverbank, it was exposed and visible to see. And such a wonder!
As a lapsed day drinking fifteen-year-old princess, the first ale hit me pretty hard, and I enjoyed the spectacle all the more for it. It had been a while since I’d had midday alcohol. All the training, weapons and magic, had consumed most of my days. And the endless suitors, the councilors I could never find but was constantly assured existed, military updates and so on, just no time to be a daytime drunk. Probably for the best.
This place was, I realized now that I was sitting here, where I’d been introduced to their foods and beverages. Not too far from where I was now sitting, anyway. The awful lead sugar – I shuddered at that thought – that I’d successfully removed from, if not the culture, at least my entourage.
“Your Highness?” Brundle asked, breaking me out of my reverie.
“What’s that?”
“Have you given any thought to your castle?”
My eyes lazily refocused on the general. “My castle?”
“Yes. It will almost certainly be occupied. The Ketzillians may not surrender it, nor face us on the battlefield. They may try to hold the castle.”
“I thought that was impossible against mages. That they’d turn the walls into explosive weapons and all that.”
“Yes, it’s true they could do that, but it is your castle. Do you want the Ketzillians expelled from it by destroying the castle itself?”
“Huh. Good point. It’d probably be best to take the castle intact. You know, so we have a place to sleep after all is said and done.”
“Your Highness,” a woman’s voice from behind me said, “if I may offer some suggestions?”
Sitting cross legged, I wheeled my body around to look. It was Aisu. “By all means. And,” I waved my hand at the sheet we sat on, “please join us.”
She ran her right hand through her long, blue tinted, black hair, and sat. Her face, with its pretty and fine, angled features, gave a look of distaste, like something putrid was nearby.
“Is something wrong?”
“Forgive me, it’s the iron. The perseidian iron you’re all wearing. I find it loathsome.”
“Oh? Neither Grand Magister Tye nor Etienne seemed bothered by it.”
“It affects each of us differently. I’m particularly sensitive. It’s like a foul smell, though more of an emanation. I am diminished in its presence.”
At the mention of the iron, I’d been unconsciously twirling the bracelet around my right wrist with my left hand. Seeing this, I stopped, embarrassed. I backed up a bit, “Should we remove it? I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.”
Morry snorted, but Aisu said, “No, my lady. It’s for your protection. I apologize for my strong reaction. I’ll keep myself under better control in the future.” She visibly relaxed and though I knew it was forced, it looked natural. This reaction was perhaps why she hadn’t spent time with me during our march.
A servant brought Aisu a mug and Brundle spoke up, “What would you suggest we do about the castle, if it’s occupied when we arrive?”
“We can, a few of us, enter the castle and clear it out without issue. And minimal damage. Mostly blood stains and bodies. Perhaps distasteful to some, but it would be simple to accomplish.”
That imagery reminded me of the mage battles I’d witnessed where bodies simply exploded, some after lightning strikes. I took a sip from my mug to hide my own repulsion.
Morry spoke up for the first time, “It would be the fastest and least dangerous way of clearing the castle.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” I said, “but if it does, that plan works for me. Although we will be losing revenue from the slave trade.”
Morry caught himself before he spit up his ale, and Brundle gave me a long, hard stare, but Aisu, quite serious, said, “We can subdue them, but it will take more work and require soldiers to accompany us into the castle.”
“I’m sorry, sorry, Lady Asiu, that was a bad joke. I’m wholly against, well, all kinds of things, but also the slave trade. It’s a dirty business.”
“If my lady doesn’t mind, now that you have my council on the matter of taking the castle, I will take my leave.”
“Uh, sure. Of course. Thank you.”
She stood up and walked with what I’m sure was careful, concerted effort not to run. I looked at my bracelet in the sunlight. “This must really bother her.”
“It also means,” said Morry, “that she is aware of where we are at all times.”
I cocked my head, “Huh. That’s disturbing. I wonder what the distance is.”
“And whether other mages can sense the same,” added Brundle.
I said, “It would be bad if the distance is great. They can still attack us with this iron on, only the attacks must be indirect. She could, for example, divert the river onto us.”
“That’d kill us all the same.”
“Yes, it could.” My mind once again went to wondering at these people, their great power and, inevitably, whether it was possible to destroy them all. Perhaps it wasn’t necessary. They did not challenge the power system in place. But they didn’t make it better. For the life of me, I could not figure out their angle. Why wouldn’t they act in self-interest? Too great a conflict of power, perhaps.
But surely, some mages must be selfish. Or psychopathic. Unless they carefully weeded them out. Etienne did say he was the sole survivor of all his fellow students. That’s got to make for a boring graduation afterparty.
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