his kingdom still lives, and the Princess; thanks to you and all of us who fought today.”
“I don’t want to fight anymore,” said Rury from where he lay. “And I don’t want to kill. I just want to go home.”
Erek smiled sadly. “That’s all any of us wanted, Rury. Perhaps when you sent out that cry we all truly realized what the Tedrel would take from us. Maybe that’s why we won out in the end.”
“Well,” grunted Sergeant Krandal, “right now none of us look like we won.” He reached up a hand and grimaced as Erek hauled him to his feet. “I’m getting too old for this.” He tried his injured leg, winced, and balanced on his good one while Erek helped Rury up.
In the distance a body wrapped in the King’s banner was borne and carried up the hill by Heralds and officers, followed by a young, new Queen. None noticed three ragged men and a Companion, upon whom the tide of battle may have turned, limping slowly away.
Years passed, and old veterans remembered their own golden valor, a heroic king and a brave, beautiful girl made queen. The memory of a searing cry piercing the thunder of war faded, until it was less than the distant calling of crows on a battlefield far from home.
STRENGTH AND HONOR
Ben Ohlander was born in South Dakota in 1965 and grew up in Colorado and North Carolina. After completing high school, he did a stretch in the Marines before attending college in Ohio. Upon graduation, he was commissioned as an officer in the Army Reserve, and is now serving on active duty in eastern Iraq. In his civilian interludes he works as a data analyst, part-time writer, and cat owner. He currently lives in southwest Ohio.
COGERN, Warmaster of the Nineteenth Foot, Hero of the Regiment, and Beloved of V’kandis, paced in the blazing desert sun. A distant smudge on the horizon drew his eye. He watched it a while as it spread laterally. The thought of an attacking force crossing the high desert at noon fell into folly, but he looked for it anyway. Folly, served judiciously, could be well employed. He’d employed it himself.
The smudge resolved itself. Not infantry. Dust storm. Typical weather for this time of year, but one of his least favorite things about his home country. He often wondered why they fought so hard to defend the place. The oft-heard comment was that the sun was the gift of V’kandis . . . too bad he’d been so generous. Dust storm looked like it would pass them by.
He wiped the sweat that rolled down his scarred head with his dog rag and checked the sentries. They were all alert and jittery. The village that lay hard by the oasis should have been brimming with life . . . children playing, women coming down for water. The presence of two thousand soldiers in the area should have meant a steady stream of fruit sellers, merchants, and the odd maiden intent on trading favors for silver.
Now, nothing. No bodies, no sign of the haste or force. Just no villagers. The place had been abandoned, as though everyone—man, woman, and brat—had simply walked away. The empty village wasn’t central to their being there, but it felt bad.
Cogern wiped his brow again, tracing a clean streak in the dust that marked his forehead. He hated mysteries, especially when his regiment lay vulnerable . . . sprawled, with armor shed, in the thin shade of the date palms that clustered close to the oasis. He didn’t need to look back to know that most men slept while others diced or talked quietly. All moved as little as possible.
He glanced to his right, seeing movement. A soldier made water, catching the fluid in a small bowl for the chirurgeon, who stood nearby. Cogern shook his head and stepped over. He would have dismissed the Valdemaran as a quack, just another foreigner with strange notions . . . had it not been for the man’s skill with the arrow-spoon and scalpel. Cogern knew little about the chirurgeon, only that Tregaran had taken his service after some vague indiscretion back home. Cogern appreciated the man’s skill and soft hands, but not his motives. That made him bear watching.
Cogern shook his head in polite disbelief as the man swirled the water in his bowl. The chirurgeon believed a good deal in piss.
“See, the dark water here?” the Valdemaran said, his accent mauling Karse’s more sophisticated sibilants. His head and the trooper’s leaned together, peering into the bowl. “These are your humors, growing cloudy. You need to keep them flushed out. Dark-yellow or brown mark a sure sign that your body’s fluids are clogging up. Yellow is liver humor, light-colored, not so bad. Dark yellow, is bad. Brown worse.”
Cogern, interested in spite of the obvious quackery, craned his head a little, to better see. “Then what?”
The quack with the soft hands looked at him and smiled. “Ah, Warmaster. A little interest? If the humors get too thick, aren’t kept flushed out, then they back up and clog the heart. You die.”
The trooper looked worriedly into his bowl. “Ahm I gunna die?” His homespun accent and credulity gave away his country roots.
The chirurgeon glanced sideways and smiled. “A laxative, a quick lancet to the wrist vein to bleed a little, and as much water as could be drunk oft fixes the imbalance.”
The trooper paled. “Ah, lancet?”
The quack smiled. “Maybe not the lancet. Drink as much water as you can hold, and bring your bowl to me tonight. If it’s clear, we’ll hold the lancet for now.”
The trooper nodded once and moved away. Cogern smiled as the lad headed for the Oasis.
The chirurgeon grinned. “The water seems the most needful. The laxative is only if the stools dry out and become too firm. The needle . . .”
Cogern understood. “Soldiers trade in blood, and hate to see their own shed. The trooper will drink to bursting to avoid being bled. Clever.”
Cogern didn’t have any use for chirurgeons, but he did admit this one knew his trade better than most. Most proved no better than butchers, and far too many enjoyed the blood shed. Though, to be honest, he did keep track of the color of his water now. No man but an enemy would bleed him, but drinking a little more water every now and again didn’t seem to hurt. As for the rest.
The chirurgeon, understanding he’d been dismissed, eased away.
“Quit stalling, man,” Cogern said to himself, as the quack stepped away to check on the next man. “Time to get it over with.”
He crossed to the colonel’s tent, passed between the sweating sentries with a nod, and entered. Inside, he drew himself up into full attention. “Sir, the warmaster requests permission to speak!”
Colonel Tregaran groaned once, then sat up on the low cot. He shook out the drowsiness and pulled the sleeping rug around his shoulders. He felt a twinge in the left shoulder, where the Hardornan’s arrow had pierced the shield. He rubbed it ruefully. Sweat burst out of every pore, even from that small movement. He squinted at the warmaster.
Cogern’s sudden affliction of formality did not bode well. He glanced at the shade outside, and shadows in the distance. Not much into the second watch of the day. Not even noon, and the heat already a blast furnace.
“Wine?” he asked, bending to pour some of the thin, sour stuff into a camp cup. “No?” He pointed toward the village with his chin. “Any sign?”
Cogern shook his head once. “No. Scouts have been out all morning. Solid trail, sir, going back up into the wadis, but no idea of why. Doesn’t look like a threat. It’s just . . . strange.”
“Yes,” Tregaran agreed, “but it’s part of the reason we’re here.”
He felt Cogern relax. The commander’s duty to set the orders, the warmaster’s to keep them. Cogern was used to being aware of his colonel’s thoughts, though, and Tregaran’s refusal to include the warmaster this time had chafed the older man.
Cogern leaped like a stone-lion at Tregaran’s opening, his bottled frustration spilling over. “Sir, what in the nineteen hells are we doing here?” Having started, his carefully rehearsed speech abandoned him, and the rest tumbled out in a heap. “We left our post, followed you across the high desert in summer, and laagered within a night’s march from Sunhame. Why?”
Tregaran took a sip of wine, making a face at the sour bite. He looked down at the cup and the slightly oily surface of the liquid inside. He smiled, and made the decision to give it to the warmaster straight up. “The Black- robes have assembled a force . . . an army really . . . and are preparing to overthrow the hierarchs, and put one of their own on the Sun Seat.”
Cogern prided himself on being unflappable, no matter the provocation. The slight widening of his eyes equaled most others’ dropping jaw. He sat on the camp stool without being bid and reached out blindly. Tregaran
