Squire of War

by M. H. Johnson

  But even in the midst of that desperate struggle, Jess had known they would be dead.

  Sacks of ruptured organs, splashes of crimson painting even the still trembling students.

  Jess could only imagine what they had seen.

  Still could not believe the mad look she had exchanged with her brother, as if they had shared a dark secret they had both sworn to forget, long ago.

  So damned long ago.

  Jess shook, trembling, even as the storm howled on.

  “Jess, we have to move, now!”

  Alex’s voice.

  Jess swallowed and nodded, helping to mount the surviving students, somehow managing three to a horse, mercy as well, she herself leading them at a mad run, her friend held in arms that no longer bothered to hide their strength.

  “Oh gods, we’re not going to make it! That’s a shadowstorm!” The panicked cry of one of the students.

  “Shut up, Kaylin, we damn well will!” cried another. “Look, the Squires have all made the treeline, Jess. Thank the gods you came, lead us there!”

  But Jess already was, as fast as she could drag the reins, shaking with unspeakable horror, feeling the roar of that terrible storm just behind her, the awful vortex of wind already sucking at the grass by her feet.

  A student screamed. “It almost plucked me from the mount!”

  “Hold tighter!” Jess roared.

  A desperate surge.

  Panicked grass now firmly rubbing against hooves and feet.

  Desperate traction as Jess broke into a run, a sobbing Jera in her arms still, even as the sky turned black as night, the students screaming desperately.

  “Ilia! She was pulled free!”

  Jess sacrificed one awful moment as they reached the treeline, seeing a young girl tumbling down the slight incline behind them, gazing at Jess with desperate eyes as she tumbled helplessly into the massive vortex of howling winds racing for the treeline.

  “Jess!” Jera’s desperate voice. “There is nothing you can do! We need to move, now!”

  And with an awful sob, Jess plunged back into the underbrush as the massive vortex of hellish, shrieking winds chased them, but feet behind.

  “Calenbry, report!”

  Eloquin’s furious gaze.

  Jess trembled and shook before it.

  She would stand strong. She must.

  Fist to chest. “Ten surviving students and myself.” She swallowed, forcing herself to speak.

  “The Squires?" Jess gasped.

  Only a moment did his icy gaze spear her heart, but it was a killing blow.

  “All accounted for, save for Malek himself,” he said at last. “No time to talk. We move now! Lead, Calenbry. Redeem your inconceivable folly, and pull your brothers free of this black hell that would suck us all in!”

  Trembling, Jess nodded, gazing into the eyes of her fellow Squires as she did so. Some were gazing at her with awe, dipping their heads before her, others spearing her with their glares.

  They knew all too well that her impetuous folly, splitting their forces, charging ahead into the heart of a storm that would consume them even now if it could, had almost killed them.

  A horrific truth Jess couldn’t deny, even as her heart writhed, even as she gazed at ten trembling students, alive only because she had committed such unforgivable folly.

  She would run through the night if she must, on legs trembling with fatigue and pain. Whatever could free her friends from this storm.

  If they were lost to folly, consumed by the horror even now howling above, leaves rustling frantically, it would haunt Jess without surcease.

  And the thought that she might have lost her closest friend…

  She choked down a sob.

  No time.

  No time at all.

  Those she loved needed her.

  She would see them safely home, even if she died of exhaustion.

  Even if they would crucify her for a fool, first she would see them safely home.

  “This way!” Jess cried, sensing strange truths in those woods, wordlessly accepting the flask Neal handed her trembling hands, drinking deep, realizing in that moment how desperately she needed it.

  “There is only this moment, shieldsister. Just lead us home.”

  She jerked a nod, picking up her pace, chasing that odd frisson of certainty, even as the hideous storm howled overhead.

  “Oh, by the gods, we’re all dead! We can’t outrun a shadowstorm, it’s tearing through the trees. It will eat us alive!” One girl sobbed.

  “Shut up!” Eloquin snapped. “Fear is the greatest weapon any foe can use against you. Do not be so stupid as to use it on yourself! Squires, orderly ranks. Make sure the foolish children don’t bolt or flee their mares. Calenbry! I gave you no permission to take your ease! You lead us on at a sprint, not a walk!”

  “Yes sir!” Jess cried, for all that she had been racing, going slow enough only to grasp the shiver of certainty now coursing through her.

  More than one student shrieked.

  The storm was now overhead.

  Jess burst into a small clearing in the heart of the woods, even as the dappled shafts of soothing green light shimmering from the foliage overhead turned black as death, hideous howls filling the clearing.

  Alex’s panicked gaze met her own.

  “I am so sorry, Jess. By all the gods, I am so sorry for all of this.”

  “Bloody hells, I am not dying here!” Mortant roared, readying himself as if to dart back into the thicker underbrush. “By all the gods, I can’t get back through! Jess, help me!”

  Soft murmurs turned to growing panic.

  “You will calm yourselves, now!” Eloquin roared. “Calenbry, you know what you must do!”

  Jess shivered and nodded. Knowing exactly what she must do. “Everyone hold hands, in a circle. Do it now!”

  “What are you talking about, Jess? We have to move, this is madness!” Lucas snapped, before cursing in sudden pain. “Hell with you, Neal!”

  “Silence!” Neal snapped. “Now, more than at any time in our bloody lives, you follow commands! Our Jess dances too close to folly, but she is no fool. You need only look around and see us all still alive, despite that horror of a botched battle, to know that’s true.”

  Jess felt her cheeks flush with shame once more, bowing her head.

  Eloquin’s hard eyes locked with her own. She trembled and stepped back.

  Her glove was torn off. A powerful hand gently clasping hers. “Time enough for shame later, Calenbry. Now you will see this through.”

  “Yes,” Jess sobbed, nodding resolutely, all their band immediately following their commander’s lead, Alex taking Jess’s right hand, linked to all his fellows, the entire circle of mages and Squires linked as one.

  Jess smiled through her tears, gazing at so many faces staring back with desperate hope, peers she loved with all her heart.

  “Close your eyes,” she whispered, glaring at each and every one of them until even Lucas and Mortant, both scowling, closed their eyes at last. “Now envision this glade, just as you saw it, all of us here holding hands.”

  “This isn’t helping,” one trembling voice whispered as the howling winds shrieked ever louder overhead.

  “Silence!” Eloquin barked. The younger voice sobbed.

  “What you hear is not the howling of a gale, but the lapping of waves upon the shore nearby. What you feel is not the eddies of ill weather, but a fresh spring breeze, smelling of honeysuckle, cyprus and thyme; the bounty of a thousand thousand wildflowers in the fields just beyond a place of laughter and joy, where children play endless games and sing ancient songs as old as time itself.”

  Jess smiled, tears in her eyes. “Even now, you will find our fallen friends there, those we have loved and lost, singing and laughing away days of endless summer, telling tales of magic, mystery, and wonder; sharing stories of loving families, babes they had watched blossom from tiny infants to adults strong and proud. Rich lives lived, full
of warmth and laughter, sweet tales to add to the greatest song of all, existence itself. Can you hear them laughing and singing? Can you sense them just beyond this tiny glade?”

  “Yes!” A voice shivering with wonder. Jera’s.

  “Yes, Jess, I can hear them. It’s like, it’s like they’re calling to me!”

  “You will hold!” Eloquin snapped, his voice instantly softening. “My foolish student has already risked everything saving you once. Do not seek rebirth yet, Jera de Leon. You have just begun to tell your tale, and you know bloody well that the lover by your side would miss you fiercely, if you dared to answer their call.”

  Jess shuddered at those words, but held fiercely tight to the beautiful fantasy she felt flowing out of her. She knew that there was nothing she could do about the storm. Thick woodlands full of underbrush would stop most winds, she was sure. But panic would result in their deaths faster than anything else.

  There was no way she could possibly outrun a storm. So hunkering down, hands linked, off mounts that might panic themselves, was their best bet for survival. And if her sweet tale was one they could latch onto? All the better. She was already in love with the tome of adventure Liam and Sable had gifted her with, and this story she was dreaming up came so naturally to her lips.

  Tales of flying upon wondrous skies full of endless billowing clouds upon which majestic ivory castles lay, home to winged faeries and wondrous beasts and their endless adventures within those majestic heavens forever kissed by the first rays of dawn. Maiden’s rescued, warrior queens married, and villains vanquished. Triumphs celebrated with endless feasts of the most exotic fare, the finest wine, mead of the gods, delicate pastries so sweet they tasted of sugar and air.

  Jess lost herself in the revelry of endless stories, desperate to make amends for tragedy so narrowly averted, desperate to forget the fate of her beloved shieldbrother whose presence she yearned for at that very moment, imagining his maverick grin as he teased her silly children’s tales. For a time, she forgot all her regrets and fears, savoring the wonder of delicious fantasy such that she blotted out all awareness of the storm roaring so fiercely above them, thinking it no more than the soft rustle of branches overhead.

  “By the gods, you did it, Jess. You did it!”

  Jess blinked and stepped back, strangely dizzy, stumbling to her rear. More than one of her fellows chuckled in sympathy, though many were trembling with remembered horror still.

  Yet all of them were blinking with wonder, gazing about, more than a few crying with relief.

  The storm had passed.

  25

  Eloquin gave a resolute nod, lifting Jess to her feet.

  His eyes caught her own.

  She trembled and looked away. So fierce was his gaze. Jess feared he would explode.

  “Lead us home, Calenbry,” was all he said.

  Had she redeemed herself the tiniest bit, soothing over two score souls til the storm had passed? Jess choked back a sob. Realizing it didn’t matter.

  No matter how her friends gazed at her with relieved smiles, beaming with pride as they dipped their heads, Jess knew she was guilty of the most horrid breach of trust.

  She had disobeyed her commander’s direct orders. She had split the Squires in intent and purpose, charging headlong into superior numbers, distant enough that her beloved friends had been denied the full strength of her gifts.

  Injuries had been sustained, injured Squires hissing and groaning even at that very moment, Jess spared eternal guilt only in the hopes that they were not as severe as they could have been. Bad bruises, masterwork helmets dinged but not cracked or caved in, collar bones broken but no worse, thank all the gods in the Heavens above.

  Jess trembled, catching the eyes of wounded friends, seeing them smile so bravely back, when they should hate her for so foolishly risking their lives.

  Yet the gazes Jera and Alex sent her, eyes so bright with gratitude, hands clenched fiercely in each other’s grips, warmed her heart.

  “By all the gods, Jess. I don’t, I don’t have the words.” Jera’s soft voice.

  “Silence!” Eloquin barked. “You all have so much to answer for, it is beyond words. And this is not the time or place for it. Calenbry has one last task before she is to face reprimand. Allow her the grace of that final virtue, before sentence is passed.”

  Jess trembled, choking back a sob, knowing her worst fears were about to be made manifest. And it did not stop her from hiking boldly on through endless woodlands, the soothing susurrations of branches overhead barely easing her anxious heart. And when they finally broke forest cover, emerging in sight of the northern road, and Eloquin bade her carefully lace up her boots and proceed at a trot, students now all sharing mounts with the lightest Squires save for Jess alone, she did naught but pound fist to chest, jogging at a steady pace as the day wore on.

  “Faster, Calenbry! Unless you tire of a Squire’s burden, tire of a Squire’s need for discipline, discipline that all your brothers and sisters depend upon! You may shed your armaments at any time, Calenbry, and make off for your father’s barony, the moment your heart desires!”

  All the Squires were shocked to silence, Neal and several others gazing coldly on. Jera gasped. “You can’t be serious,” she whispered.

  “Silence,” Alex hushed, shaking his head emphatically, Jera trembling before the general’s furious gaze.

  Tears silently running down her cheeks, Jess gave an exhausted salute, running on, even as her stride turned to a stumbling jog, feet blistered, heaving with exhaustion, collapsing to the ground.

  “Get up, Calenbry! I did not give you leave to fall, any more than I did to charge like a fool into a warded encampment, terrain favored by our enemy, a trio of mages ready to tear you fools apart with dark magics you can barely fathom! Only by the goddess’s own luck did you survive, and no thanks to you playing an utter fool! You and your asinine, arrogant shieldbrother charging in, leaving your fellows uncertain and divided, closest friends who owe you their lives too bound by honor not to charge behind, no matter that you have just fractured the chain of command, devastated morale, and put all those lives at risk as you broke the one cardinal rule you must never ignore, staying at the heart of any charge or retreat. For you alone, foolish girl, can counter those lances!”

  Jess sobbed, stumbling to her feet.

  And Eloquin leaped off his horse, glaring at Jess as she stumbled back, tripping to the ground once more. “Twelve, when we had forty! And I told you, fool, that none of us were to proceed, as the plains were twisting under a storm of darkest Shadow, and still you charged on! Still you played the fool, when by all rights you should all be dead, and I’m having to face your father, explaining to him how I let his eldest die! Not in glory, but as a fool who couldn’t follow simple orders!”

  He turned to glare at the apprentices they had saved, shaking his head in contempt. “If you fools hadn’t dared that which your masters clearly forbid, deceiving your proctors about your intentions so none of us knew where you were truly headed, trusting only the two easily bribed guards, all too happy to sell you out in turn! Had you spoken to any instructor who would have spoken to me, I could have prevented this whole damned folly from occurring!”

  Eloquin trembled with hot fury, eyes blazing, hand tight upon his saber. Never had Jess seen her icy commander as anything but the most exquisitely ruthless and deadly of foes. Never had he lost control in all the months (years) she had fought beside him. Never.

  “Please,” Jess whispered, terrified to think of the folly but a hairsbreadth away, the surviving apprentices gazing at Eloquin in speechless horror, trembling where they sat, the Squires leading their mounts gazing down at their saddles, utterly still.

  Eloquin’s hooded gaze snapped around to fasten upon Jess once more.

  She felt as if she were drowning in icy seas so cold they sucked the heat from her bones in an instant.

  “Move, Calenbry.”

  Choking back an exhausted sob, Jes
s did just that.

  Never had she felt so weary, so sick with exhaustion as when the magnificent keep that was Highrock popped into view, massive and proud, carved into the very cliff face it had been named from. An architectural wonder.

  And all Jess felt was sick, as she collapsed to the ground, heaving in exhaustion.

  “Neal!” Eloquin’s voice cracked through the air.

  “Yes, commander.”

  “Give the penitent a flask of water.”

  Yes sir.

  “Then relieve her of all her gear.”

  Jess was too exhausted to do other than take slow sips as Neal gently tended to her, taking off her armor as gracefully as he could when he had finished, all without saying a word.

  Eloquin turned to the remaining Squires. “We have met bitterest folly on this day. One we had counted upon above all others fell to weakness when we needed her to remain strong. It is when passions run highest, that the chain of command must be most adhered to. Jess failed in this, and near a score of you fools almost lost your lives.” He slowly shook his head. “No. All of you would have perished to that Shadowstorm. A fate that would have been avoided entirely, had we fled upon the instant, as I was about to order!”

  His gaze was equal parts pity, disappointment, and scorn. “Calenbry is guilty of a hanging offense. And she has saved all your lives, pulling you from the fires of folly more than once, in all the High Hunts we have embraced. Never has Calenbry failed to blacken her dagger for me. Never before has she failed me like this.”

  He turned to the trembling apprentice mages, more than one openly sobbing at his gaze.

  “Please, please don’t kiss us!” One girl begged. “I just want to go home. I am so, so sorry! I just want to go home!”

  Eloquin shook his head. “Don’t be a fool. You will all accompany me and give me a full report of the idiocy that led to this catastrophically stupid tragedy. I would know all the actors upon the stage, every serpent that sought to strike vulnerable children too foolish to follow the chain of command before embarking upon your folly.”

  He turned to Jess. “And she will report to the head proctor the role your band of would-be mages all played in this hideous folly tonight. Each and every one of you will accept what punishments the head dean sees fit to dispense among you, including expulsion. I will allow the supplicant to say what must be said. A final boon for having the courage to see this through, to face her horrid folly to this degree, at least.” Furious eyes pinned their own. “Unless you fools seek to contest me?”