Thousands of tents blanketed the earth like mushrooms pushing up out of the dirt after a long rain. Smoke rose from countless torches and campfires and gathered into a thick grey haze that reached for the heavens as though it meant to challenge the gods themselves and take its chances.
Beyond the encampment the city of Baarsha loomed on the horizon. The capital of Arlania was close, so close it felt as though a man might reach out and put his fingers to its walls.
Yet the bustling activity of the military camp between here and there made the city seem a world away, and a good deal further than that for anyone hoping to walk it.
"Arlania's like a brothel," one of the younger Rolmian scouts muttered as they watched the camp from their vantage on the ridge. "Show them a coin or a blade, and their doors swing open faster than a morning bloom."
The older soldiers repeated that crude proverb often enough, laughing at the supposed cowardice of the Arlanian nobility. Most campaigns in these lands ended bloodless, being more a matter of posturing than of war. The soldiers loved them dearly for it. There was little risk of dying and ample opportunity for pillage whenever some lord proved too proud or too poor to pay a bribe into the right hands.
But today felt different, and every man on that ridge could feel it without being able to name it.
"Look at that," one scout said, squinting down at the camp. "How many do you reckon are down there?"
"Judging by the tents? Around eight thousand, give or take a few hundred," another replied, scratching at his chin. He chuckled, and the sound carried a comfortable note of dismissive arrogance. "Peasants with sticks, no doubt. No real danger in them. I'd wager half don't know which end of a spear to take hold of.We'll pack them real nice for crows and worms."
"And how many have we?" the first asked, more out of habit than concern.
"Fourteen thousand. Maybe more than that. I didn't bother with the counting. It's enough to crush them and still be home for the harvest."
Still, a small note of unease crept into the conversation the way water creeps into a boot.
"You think the local nobles went behind the emperor's back? Gave the prince support?"
"Doubt it," the second scout said, shaking his head. "When was the last time an Arlanian noble actually stood in a battle?There's no reason for them to risk everything for a prince who will be overthrown before winter ends. They'd sooner cut each other's throats at a banquet where the wine's good. Which means all this is from the prince's own hand."
"Then how do you explain their numbers?"
"Simple enough. The prince emptied his coffers. Hired on anyone willing to swing a sword for coin—"
"Shut your mouths," the older scout growled, his voice cutting through the banter like a blade through wet cloth. The two younger men snapped their heads toward him, startled by the roughness in it.
"If you've energy enough to flap your gums," the veteran continued, "then use it to narrow your eyes and look." He jabbed a calloused finger down toward the camp. "Check the heralds and stop being dumb loud fucks."
Confused, the younger scouts complied, eyes narrowing as they scanned the distant figures moving between the tents.
"I don't see anything unusual," one said, frustration creeping into his voice.
The older scout let out a sigh heavy with exasperation. "Mercenaries. The prince drained his treasury to hire them on. Congratulations, Menio. You were right for once in your life."
"So what?" the first scout said, still not grasping the weight of it. "He's broke now. If he'd had that much gold he could've paid the empire's tribute for three years running. Why in the world would he waste it on something like—"
"The Order of the Betrayed is down there," the veteran interrupted, finishing the sentence in his own way.
Silence fell like a hammer coming down on an anvil.
The younger scouts exchanged nervous glances, their faces going pale as the name sank in and settled. They all knew what it meant. Every man in the empire knew what it meant and what it forebode.
One of them swallowed hard, his voice barely above a whisper. "T...The emperor. We need to tell the emperor. Now."
"No shit," the veteran snapped. ''And I take fucking seniority...''
Without another word he spurred his horse, slamming an iron clad heel into its side. The animal whinnied in protest but surged forward regardless, kicking up a spray of dirt and gravel as it bolted down the slope.
The younger scouts scrambled to follow. The veteran did not once look back. He had no need to. All three of them understood the same thing now: this was no normal campaign. This was a storm gathering itself, and of all the men in the world who would be displeased to hear of it, the emperor stood first in line.
———————
A rough throaty voice sliced through the tense air like a blade drawn across leather.
The veteran scout knelt on the scorching ground, beads of sweat carving pale paths through the dirt on his face before vanishing into his silver streaked beard.He hated the dry air of the desert and the hot climate both, and yet he nonetheless felt cold down his spine as the emperor spoke his words.
"Repeat that. Every word you said," he growled, his tone as deep as a storm rumbling somewhere below the horizon.
The scout swallowed hard, his throat dry as sandpaper. "Your Imperial Majesty, we've just returned from our mission and bring urgent news," he began, his voice trembling despite everything he did to hold it. "Ahead of the city we spotted a military encampment. No more than eight thousand strong. At first we assumed them noble forces, but as we drew nearer we realised..."
The words caught in his throat. He forced himself onward regardless.From the tail of his eyes he saw the nobles take a generous step back.
"We realised they weren't nobles at all, but mercenaries. Their banners gave them away. Black and silver. A dagger on a black field, alongside a headless eagle. Your Grace, it's the Order of the Betrayed.They were hired by the princeling and took the field against you."
A cold silence gripped the room like a vice being turned.
"They weren't alone," the scout pressed on, desperation edging into his voice now. "I also made out the banners of the Rapid Company, and the Golden Cl—"
The emperor's fist came crashing down onto the table, and the scout thanked the Gods it was not his face. The wood cracked, then splintered outright, sending goblets and a pitcher of wine flying across the carpet. Still, he froze where he knelt as splinters peppered the air above him.
"OUT!" the emperor bellowed, and the scout scrambled to his feet and fled the tent as though his life hung on the speed of it, which it very possibly did.
The nobles within stood motionless, their gazes fixed upon the ground between their own boots. Not one of them dared meet the emperor's eyes. They understood far too well that this was no moment for words, and that the first man to offer any would regret it longest.
"HOW?!" the emperor roared, and the air itself seemed to shake with it. He turned upon one of the older nobles, a man with a single steely eye, the other hidden behind a patch of black leather. "HOW IN THE NAME OF ALL THE GODS DID THEY GET THERE WITHOUT YOU KNOWING?!"
The old noble flinched beneath the glare. The memory of his lost eye surged up to the front of his mind unbidden, the way it always did when he shouted: ripped from its socket by , the searing agony of the knife, the stink of his own flesh burning as they cauterised the wound. Even now the phantom pain haunted him, and it made his remaining eye twitch beneath the emperor's unrelenting stare.
"CAN YOU HEAR ME?! OR ARE YOUR EARS JUST DECORATION NOW? DID YOU LOSE THOSE TOO BY THE DESERT DOGS?!" The emperor advanced, and every step of it was a threat in its own right.
The emperor's spymaster, Julian, took a cautious step forward with his head bowed low. "Your Grace, I. My spies—"
"YOUR spies?" the emperor interrupted, his voice dripping venom.
"Our spies, your spies, Your Imeprial Majesty," Julian corrected hastily, the words tumbling over one another to get out of his mouth. "They reported nothing. We had no indication whatsoever, no knowledge of this force at all. I cannot explain it how—"
The emperor's voice turned ice cold, and that was a great deal more dangerous than the shouting had been.
"I do not pay you for cannot. Do you know what I waste on you every year? You are my eyes. You are my ears. You are meant to see and hear everything that moves in this world. What earthly good is a spymaster who knows NOTHING?You know how much I searched for them?Only to be made a fool of in my campaign? Get out of my sight. Now."
Julian bowed deeply and left without another word, his face grey as ash. He had seen the emperor angry before, many times. Never once like this.Certain threads about the man were never to be spoken, much less touched.
Then one of the younger nobles, whose family had seen fit to send him along for his first taste of war, found he could not make sense of any of it, and leaned toward the man beside him.
"What is the problem?What's happening?"
The room fell into a silence heavier than the one before it. That question had not come out nearly so softly as he had intended it to.
The answer came swift and brutal, and not from the man at his side.
The young noble was on the floor before he understood that anything had happened at all, his lips split open and his teeth scattered across the carpet like dropped dice. Above him stood the emperor, steel prosthetic hand raised high and glinting in the firelight, a few crimson drops sliding slowly down the cold metal to the thirsty sand below.
No one said a word. There was a reason the man could do such a thing without fear of reprisal, and it was not that he wore a crown. It was the manner in which he had come to wear it.
"THIS IS THE FUCKING PROBLEM!" the emperor roared, raw and thunderous, slamming the prosthetic into the air beside the young man's head.
The room recoiled as one body as he loomed over the trembling boy and thrust the steel hand toward his face.
"SEE THIS? SEE THIS FUCKING THING? AND THIS CROWN UPON MY HEAD? BOTH OF THEM WERE GIFTS—" His voice broke down into a bitter growl. "Gifts and curses both, from those cunts. The very same bastards flying their banners outside that city as we stand here.Mocking me as they go on about their day!"
He straightened, the rage in his eyes burning like a field fire with a wind behind it.He breathed and tried to calm himself, especially now as the memory resurfaced unbidden and unwelcomed.
"Those cunts took my hand. And took my father with it. And now they march beneath that prince's flag, breathing down the back of my neck."
The nobles stayed silent, faces pale, as the words landed among them.
"I will not let this insult stand," he snarled. "Not again. Not while I still draw breath. Be it the last thing I do, but I will do it. Fate has finally handed me the opportunity I have been hunting for years."
The young noble whimpered quietly on the floor, and for a single moment the emperor's gaze softened, just barely, before hardening over again.
The boy was from a good family, after all.That was ill done.
"Clean him up," the emperor ordered one of the guards. "The rest of you, back to work. We march at dawn. By tomorrow night I want every lieutenant of that band standing on a pike rotting. I will take their captain skull and make a cup to piss in."