Skybound

 Millie Thatcher slumped against the side of the wagon, sagging with relief. Dismounting with only one arm was difficult enough under ideal circumstances -- and with her body feeling leaden and sluggish from her exertion, her current circumstances were far from ideal. The day was only half done, she knew, and, doubtless, the Black Lance would shortly resume its tireless march after only the briefest respite to water horses and let the soldiers see to their own needs. Millie’s heart pounded in her chest, echoing the beat of her recently-acquired skill. 

While Millie was the Lance’s first and youngest bard, she was by no means its only bard; four others now rode in the column behind her, spread through the formation, and her new skill, [Savage Syncopation], allowed her to share the duties of setting tempo and pace with her new fellows. It had taken her several days to get used to it, but she could now fall into a trance-like state, her awareness narrowing to the beat of her drum and the road ahead. She remained dimly aware, however, of the state of the column and especially of the General, allowing her to quickly respond to orders.

One major disadvantage of her skill manifested itself when that order was to halt the column. Her nearly single-minded focus on the forward march made it difficult to come out of her trance to begin slowing down; when she did, she had to resist the urge to simply stop drumming. Doing so threw her fellows into disarray, and caused a headache that would take hours to subside. She was, however, slowly learning to ease herself and the column into a stop.

She knew, however, that the order to halt the column wasn’t truly his; nearly an hour ago, a great shadow had broken through the cloud cover that seemed to always follow Millie’s drumming, preceded by a long and mournful cry. Archers and mages had prepared their weapons, only to be shouted down by the old muleman, Hett; not long after, the well-leathered Hanz Geremas had swooped down on drakeback. He’d surged forward to catch Jacob’s attention, then waved the column into the foothills off the side of the path. The next time Millie saw the drake, it had landed on one of a pair of hilltops separated by a wide, shallow gully. Several felled trees on the drake’s side lay as testament to its strength, and with a short burst from its maw, a great bonfire surged forth.

Millie’s curiosity overrode her tiredness, keeping her from falling asleep as she accepted a piece of jerky from Hett as he dismounted. “It seems the king wants a word with Jacob,” he grunted, snacking on his own piece of meat. The seemingly endless supply of food Hett possessed was one benefit of riding with him; Millie was levelling quickly and was always hungry, even beyond the normal appetite of a growing teenager. She didn’t complain; beyond that it was her duty, the long hours meant that Lady Erin -- Duchess Erin, now -- no longer had the time to set her to her letters with Lady Jenna. She knew the words well enough by now, anyway; the practice was merely to improve her handwriting, now that she’d lost her dominant hand.

As Millie finished her snack, she saw Laren Torm, the merchant’s wife, approach. A seeress of some description, Millie was sure; she’d heard the woman browbeat her husband into compliance with Jacob’s orders on no small number of occasions, speaking of omens both good and ill. She raised her arm, catching Millie’s attention.

“He’ll be wanting you on the hilltop,” Laren said without preamble. “And you’ve marched a lot further than he thought, so he’s calling a halt today, so we can rest and recover naturally.” She walked away as abruptly as she arrived, heedless of Millie’s eyes on her back. As she disappeared towards the rear of the wagon train, Millie could hear her screech for her husband, demanding that he unpack flour and spices. 

Less than a minute later, a man trotted up to Hett’s wagon -- one of the Lance-Captains, to judge by the insignia adorning his uniform. To Millie’s shame, she didn’t know the man’s name, even though she should have. He glanced between Hett and Millie.

“We’re getting an early rest tonight, and a full night’s sleep,” he reported. “And the General asked me to tell you that he wants to meet with his staff before he sees the king. That means you, too, Corporal,” he reminded Millie. It took her a moment to associate the rank with herself, but she quickly acknowledged the order with a crisp salute. Ever since other bards had manifested among the convoy, the Battlemaster had promoted Millie over them to act as their mentor.

Hett didn’t salute. Millie had never seen the old man salute anyone -- not the royalty at the Gathering, nor even the [Oracle] herself. He merely nodded, retrieving his axe from underneath the seat and slipping it through the loop on his belt before walking off. Millie hurried in his wake, heading towards the front of the column where the Battlemaster waited.

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Jenna Tillersen held a steel circle at arms’ length, pouring her concentration into it. The final stage of enchanting an artifact was always the most difficult for her; as a [Water Witch], it wasn’t something that came naturally. ‘Difficult’ and ‘not natural’ didn’t add up to ‘impossible,’ however, and the process of discovering her own way to go about it was proving exceptionally effective at improving her skills; the same held true for the Lance’s other adepts, who quickly adopted Jenna’s methods.

With a brief hum and a flare of mana, the steel circle merged with the silver triangle, becoming a single piece. Within the triangle, thin copper threads held a mana crystal. She lowered the piece, sweat pouring from her brow, and once more decried the necessity of steel. Silver would have been easier to work, and mithril easier than either; the Black Lance, however, had none of the latter and precious little of the former.

Her husband, Davin Tillersen, had signed on with the Duke of the Endless March before leaving the City of Prophets. She had followed; there was simply nothing to return to in South Hollows. Their minor land holdings, only enough to grant them the barest sliver of nobility in the eyes of the court, now lay in smoking ruins. The population of the small village, if they had neither fled nor joined up with Jacob and Erin Ward, had fallen into Deskren slavery. The soldiers, however, still insisted on calling her and her husband Lady and Lord, however unwarranted she thought it was.

Perhaps one day, maybe even soon, she thought as she climbed down from the wagon. Even on the march, the mages weren’t spared any labors; for the past several days, they had been laboring to offer the Duke a solution to a request he had made: modifications to a standard [Icefall] spell. To her confusion, he hadn’t asked for a more powerful version, but rather one spread across a wider area. Fortunately, such a change was easier to work into a lower-quality material, but more than a few of the new Battle-Mages had expressed confusion as to the reason for their labor. Neither the General nor Duchess Erin had seen fit to explain, but neither had they punished the askers. Regardless, Jenna was sure that the reasons for their request would be made clear in time, and would doubtless be as unexpected and potent as everything else they had accomplished.

She dismounted the wagon, and looked around in confusion. It was too early for their normal camp, and they had rarely left sight of the path since they left Possibility -- but here they were, deep in the hills, with King Geremas not far away. A few wagons behind her own, the merchant Belka Torm was unloading supplies from his wagon, and ordering several footmen in the construction of the firepit and cooking frame that would serve the evening meal. Regardless of why, Jenna certainly wouldn’t say ‘no’ to an actual meal instead of travel rations.

As she walked towards Belka’s cookfire, she had to jump back to dodge a squawking rooster that dashed between two wagons as it fled two of the younger Luparan Gendarmerie ex-slaves. Their snarls and yips were cut short as the two saw how close they had come to trampling the [Water Witch] underpaw, and they snapped hasty salutes as they stumbled over apologies.

“Sorry, Ma’am,” the female growled, hanging her head. “Our Captain said we could eat it if we could catch it...”

Jenna chuckled, shaking her head. “It’s been, what, a week, and you’re still chasing the poor thing?” The rooster had rapidly become a fixture among the column, its antics offering a much-welcome respite against the drudgery of the march.

The two Luparan exchanged glances. “It hides in Hett’s wagon,” the younger complained, his voice not quite a whine, and more than a little afraid. “We don’t mess with the bard, or the old man.” With a pair of respectful nods, the wolfkin resumed their hunt, breaking to either side of the wagon to recover the rooster’s trail.

There had been far less tension than Jenna would have expected between the Gendarmes and the rest of the Lancers. She didn’t know if it was their wilder nature and natural proclivity to a pack structure, but they were taking to integration under the Battlemaster much better than she would have predicted. Once they had been formed into ranks, the General had split them up and let their pack instincts take care of the rest. The squad captains kept the smaller groups in line, and there was neither time nor opportunity for division or strife. Everyone was simply too tired at the end of the day to stoop to petty bickering. A good thing, she thought. By the time everyone remembers their differences, they’ll have suffered enough together to forget them. That was her hope, at least. She had faith Jacob Ward would squash any dissent after that, anyway.

The focus her current task demanded of her kept her from devoting too much worry to it. The Duke wanted as many of the modified Icefall foci as they could produce on the way to Expedition. The process was draining and difficult enough to manage in a workshop; maintaining concentration in the back of a moving vehicle on a bumpy road was another matter entirely. At least everyone’s skills are improving with the challenge, she thought. She wasn’t sure what Jacob planned, but linking the focus rings together would allow them to magnify the effect. That part made sense to her, but diffusing the concentration of ice magic across a broader area would render the overall effect far less potent. It may hamper lower-levelled enemies, but stronger classers or well-trained groups would be inconvenienced at best. Even though she didn’t understand the reason, she merely got to work. She hadn’t understood what they were doing with the levees until they’d flooded the Deskren, and she suspected that the Battlemaster would surprise them just as effectively this time.

A Lance-Captain came trotting up before she could find a seat near the merchant’s cookfire, slowing just long enough to get her attention. “Officers and general staff meeting, Ma’am. His Grace has requested your presence as leader of the Mage squadrons.” He continued along to deliver the rest of his missives as soon as she nodded her acknowledgement. Jenna was far from mastering the salute adopted by the troops, but the Battlemaster seemed far more concerned with getting the job done than with protocol -- at least for the moment. Her husband Davin had delivered the grim news that at the earliest opportunity their commander intended to put the entire company through what he ominously called good training. Putting such thoughts out of her mind, she made her way towards the front of the column.

===========

Millie Thatcher grunted in annoyance, bracing the strap of her gauntlet in her teeth as she adjusted it, a task she was obligated to perform more often over the past several days. It still fit, but only just -- and she was still putting on lean muscle to replace the youthful padding she had lost during the refugees’ flight. Strength wasn’t a typical focus for a bard, but her combat-focused variant, along with her title, meant she did gain some with every level. Not that she was complaining; as Hett reminded her constantly, a little extra Strength never hurt anyone, but lacking it definitely could. She cast a critical eye at the thing as she arrived at the head of the column, shaking her head. I’ll have to see if one of the smiths can readjust the armor while we’re stopped tonight. There would be no time when the march resumed, and certainly not once they reached the enemy. Having finished her adjustments, Millie drew towards the head of the column.

Jacob Ward, Duke of the Endless March, and Battlemaster of the Black Lance, stood before a folding table looking down at several detailed maps. He nodded as Millie approached, gesturing to his left where an aide stepped aside to make room for the bard. He continued speaking without pause, never taking his eyes off the map after that first acknowledgement of her presence.

“I want the smiths getting as much done tonight as they can. Horseshoes for our mounts, and any repairs for the wagons that need doing. I want every axle and wheel we have greased and reinforced.” He finally looked up as Miss Jenna approached the group at the table. “Lady Jenna, do you need more of the steel rings?”

She shook her head. “We’ve finished over two dozen of them so far; at this rate, we’ll have more focus disks than Adepts to use them,” she replied. “Until we know more about what they’ll be used for, I don’t think we need to put any more back.”

“There will be a full briefing tonight, all officers and staff. First, I’ll be seeing what our visiting King has to say while everyone tends to the camp.” He tilted his head towards the hilltop where sat the massive drake and its rider, next to a rather large campfire. The King of Drakenth sat next to his mount’s massive head, a small pennant bearing the [Oracle]’s eye jammed into the ground next to him. “For now, I want all of you see to hot meals and repairs for our equipment.”

“Are we that far ahead of schedule?” Lord Davin, husband to Lady Jenna, was one of the last to approach. Millie didn’t know him very well, though she did know that what few farmers had worked his lands had nothing bad to say about him or his lady, which was far better than most noble-born she had heard of. One’s rank in their pre-Lance life seemed not to matter, anyway -- at least, not to the Battlemaster.

“By two days,” the Duke confirmed. “The [Oracle] was as ambiguous and vague as she could be on everything else, but she took pains to emphasize the timing: forty and one days. A day late, and Expedition falls; a day early, disaster.”

“An [Oracle] can’t really help that,” added Hett. “If she had even tried to be more specific, it would have cost her, and after that stunt with the bounty…” He trailed off, shaking his head.

“I’m not complaining,” said Jacob. “It’ll be enough. We get to the city on the forty-first day, and we hold until the Alpha arrives with the Tribes.”

“I’ll admit,” spoke the man on Jacob’s other side, “before the Alpha presented himself at the Gathering, I was sure you had no chance of mounting a defense of the city, let alone an invasion of the Empire.” The words were softly spoken, but with near-complete assurance. Calvin Descroix never strayed far from the Battlemaster’s side except under direct order. He seemed uncomfortable with being unbound, though he still bore the white armband that, Millie was given to understand, denoted his status as a surrendered enemy. Privately, she felt the Duke was placing far too much trust in the Deskren noble, but he had said his orders were non-discretionary. The meaning of the phrase was clear enough, but she remained vigilant, and tried to keep her hand from reaching for her knife whenever they crossed paths. She mostly succeeded.

“You will still need to contend with the desert,” he continued, “unless you can find enough transports to go by sea. Because Expedition blocks the way to Eastharbor, I believe that’s part of why the siege was ordered.”

“That’s a conversation for after we have broken the siege.” Jacob’s voice was gruff and tired, but not angry, at least for the moment. “I’m less sure that the desert is outright impossible to cross, but if it is? We shall simply find another way.”

“As you say,” nodded the Deskren noble.

“For now, hot food, horse shoes, wagon repairs, and a proper night of rest,” ordered the Duke. “The second half of this trip will be harder than the first.”

He looked up from the maps, turning an eye to each that were present, one by one. “Well? See to it! I’m not here to hold your hands, and you know how to make camp.” The officers hastily saluted, darting off to see to their respective tasks as Jacob turned to Millie-- and Duchess Erin, who had walked up beside her. 

“Corporal Thatcher, you’re with me.” He turned and nodded at Hett, who simply grunted as the Duke led them away from the tables, up the hill and across the gully to where King Geremas sat with his mount. Its bulk, even as far away as it was, dominated over the convoy’s preparations, and Millie knew that, since stopping, everyone had been trying and failing to ignore its presence.

Icy dread poured down Millie’s back as they approached the massive beast, drying out her mouth. She could only muster one rational thought as she drew to a stop before the king:

I really, really hope it’s not hungry...