Flight of the Wounded Falcon

by Trish Mercer

Private Shin’s basic training was quite extensive, not only in teaching him soldiering, but also in explaining how each soldier played a vital part in bringing order to chaos.

  Initially, he had a problem in that Mahrree Shin kept coming out of his mouth. He hadn’t realized how much of her he’d carried until he heard her arguing with the lecturing sergeant in only his second week. She had burbled out of him, quite unbidden, when the sergeant said, “The duty of the soldier is to ensure the safety of the citizenry as they go about in pursuit of their desires—”

  “So what constitutes ‘desires,’ sir?” Shin hadn’t even noticed he asked the question until everyone was looking at him, bemused.

  The staff sergeant, who was clearly unaccustomed to anyone interrupting his lectures, yet was a surprisingly patient man willing to entertain questions, stumbled for a moment until he came up with, “Well, uh, whatever they want to do.”

  “Anything, sir? We defend them in any behavior? But what if what they want to do may cause harm to someone else? Who do we protect or stop?”

  The staff sergeant glanced around as if that answer were obvious. “Stop whoever is doing the hurting.”

  “But what if the person doing the hurting claims that I, as a soldier, am interfering with his right to pursue his desire?” The strange thing was, Shin wasn’t even entirely sure what kind of scenario he was talking about, but the sergeant shifted uncomfortably, as if he knew precisely.

  “That—well, true, true—that can be a difficult issue. There are laws intended to protect those who are innocent, laws each of you will be drilled on so that you can enforce them—”

  “Who makes the laws?” Again, Shin wasn’t sure why he said that, but suddenly he was interested to know. In Salem, the laws were derived from The Writings, from the guides and their assistants, then sent out to all of Salem for them to argue, debate, then finally vote upon. A three-fourths approval was needed to enact any law. Shin had seen that happen only a couple of times in his lifetime; Salemites didn’t need many laws since they governed themselves. In fact, all of their laws fit easily on one sheet of paper which younger students penned to practice their handwriting.

  But he immediately realized that one page wasn’t the case in the world. The staff sergeant was indicating to his assistant to pass out something that was in a crate, and dropping on the desk of each soldier was a thick volume which contained at least a hundred pages.

  Each of the new recruits groaned.

  “Glad you brought this up, Shin. Only a few villages still maintain a separate law enforcement group. We find it’s more efficient to let the soldiers do that task. Open your books to the first page, and notice that the law code is broken up into twenty-three different sections, each with subsections detailing specifications—”

  Shin, boggled, thumbed through the dense print. “I’m probably breaking half a dozen of these without even realizing it,” he muttered.

  The sergeant heard him and chuckled. “Yes, indeed; I think I broke ten of them in a very vivid dream last night!”

  While the men laughed, Shin frowned at the book. “Why so many laws, sir? We can’t even enforce all of these. Who cares how many holes an outhouse has for a fishing campsite anyway?” Shin pointed to a crude illustration of a law-complying privy.

  The sergeant held up a finger. “Every law is enacted in response to a problem, accident, or situation wherein a citizen felt they were endangered.”

  Shin picked through the jargon. “So . . . someone makes a mistake, and suddenly there’s a law against it? What in the world happened to require a two-hole fishing privy?!”

  The sergeant’s expression went wooden. “The laws are designed to protect everyone.”

  “Or strangle them,” Shin mumbled.

  “What was that?” the sergeant snapped.

  “Nothing, sir. Nothing. Who, sir, by the way, came up with all of these?” he asked again, realizing that question he asked earlier hadn’t been answered.

  The sergeant puffed up his chest in what hinted would be a long-winded explanation. “All of these laws are quite reasonable—”

  “Except that we don’t have the time and resources to . . .” Shin squinted and read out loud, “‘Ensure that all flour used in a home kitchen be sifted properly before being used to avoid unground pieces breaking the tooth of someone who consumes the baked goods.’” Shin scowled. “Seriously? Inspect someone’s flour? That’s reasonable? Sir?” he added hastily when he realized how cynical he sounded.

  The sergeant narrowed his eyes. “Surely there was a reason why that reasonable law was written, and it was written, Private, by the general himself: Lemuel Thorne!”

  Oh, how Shin wished he could have kept back the words, but they flew out of his mouth. “So General Thorne is the most reasonable person in the world?” It was the snort of derision that followed his statement which got him in trouble.

  “Private Shin!” barked the sergeant. “Do you have a problem we need to address with one hundred push-ups?”

  “No, sir!” Shin responded hastily. The push-ups wouldn’t be a problem to accomplish; he just didn’t want to be known already as a trouble-maker. “I apologize, sir. It just seems to me that General Thorne’s abilities are wasted on something as menial as law-making.” He thought that was a pretty good salvage of the situation.

  The sergeant’s demeanor softened slightly. “General Thorne has taken it upon himself to lead this people, to help them live as freely as they can, as painlessly as they can.”

  “So,” Shin started again, trying to follow the reasonable thought, “lots of rules makes people freer, and also takes away all their pain? Sir, that doesn’t follow. Freedom means taking risks, experimenting, and yes—making mistakes, which frequently result in pain. But that’s life, isn’t it, sir? How can anyone ensure that no one will get hurt or make mistakes? The whole point of life is to learn from our mistakes!”

  When no one answered, but stared at him, open-mouthed, he added meekly, “Sir?”

  The sergeant tilted his head, truly perplexed, before he said, “You’re a real snock, aren’t you?”

  He still didn’t know what snock meant, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t a compliment.

  He, and his fellow new recruits who shot glances of annoyance at him, were then subjected to a long and dull lecture about the importance of upholding every rule and law, even if they didn’t understand them, in order to maintain order and discipline.

  Only two minutes into it Shin had started daydreaming, and when the sergeant finally finished, red-faced and panting from exertion about fifteen minutes later, Shin obediently agreed to enforce whatever laws he could remember.

  “So,” he ventured cautiously as he scanned the laws, some of them bordering on the insulting, “what you’re saying, sir, is that people of the world are incapable of controlling themselves or acting sensibly, so we have to make them act like . . . the adults they’re supposed to be? They’re really that stupid?”

  The sergeant held out his hands with a grand gesture and announced, “Finally Shin catches on! Where have you been, boy? Been fogged for half your life, or did you just drop out of the clouds last week?” As the rest of the soldiers chortled, Shin bobbed his head since the comment was partially true. He hadn’t realized he’d dropped into a world where people had to be told to not let their dogs attack their neighbors’ chicken coops, or be reminded that stealing clothing off the line was wrong.

  “The world is like a flock of sheep,” the sergeant told the class. “Willing to be driven by whoever will get them to the easiest pasture. All they want is to eat and breed and relax. We, men, as General Thorne has repeatedly stated, are the sheepherders. We alone keep the senseless flock safe from the wolves like Sargon and the soldiers in the south. Without us, and without the leadership of General Thorne, our villages would be destroyed in days. This,” he picked up a copy of the laws, “is our sheepherder’s staff—”

  “Not this, sir?” asked a private even more c
ocky than Shin, and he drew his sword and waved it about proudly.

  The sergeant smirked at him. “That, too. But you don’t get to fully enjoy using that until your first year is over. A few of you, judging by the scars in your ears, were vial heads, and you need a year of being clear of the vials before you get to earn the right to use that weapon in combat in the south.”

  Shin guiltily rubbed an ear.

  “The world,” the sergeant continued, “is like a stubborn horse—yes, what is it, Private Quack-Quack?”

  The private with a perpetually dazed look about him asked, “I thought they were sheep, sir?”

  The sergeant sighed. “We use several metaphors in the army.”

  Quack-Quack’s hand was going up again.

  “A metaphor,” the sergeant exhaled loudly, already guessing his next query, “is a comparison. A way to think of one thing like another. Private, just put your hand down and try to keep up, all right? It’ll make sense in a while. Or a year,” he added in a mutter. “Horses,” the sergeant picked up his lecture again. “Think of the citizenry also as stubborn horses, the kind that you know are thirsty, and you drag them to the river, but they won’t drink. But they need to drink.” The sergeant began to pace. “Sometimes, they have to be forced for their own good. Forced to do that which will save them and protect them and let them live another day.” The sergeant paused and looked directly at Private Shin, as if waiting for some kind of rebuttal.

  But Shin was thinking about the times he’d watched his uncle use his whip to get the most stubborn bulls where they needed to be. It wasn’t as if he ever actually whipped the animals, just cracked the whip right next to their ears, and they startled in another direction. He glanced up to notice the sergeant gazing at him.

  “No comment, Shin? By the way, how long until you come up with a better name?”

  “No comment, sir. Actually, I agree with you. I’ve seen some pretty stupid bulls in my time. Horses can be the same way. And I’ll probably change my name the same day Quack-Quack does.”

  A corner of the sergeant’s mouth ticked up. “The sooner, the better—for both of you.”

  As they dismissed for midday meal, Shin was pondering the many laws he had to shove into his pack and came to a realization: Salem was a very easy place to govern. The world, however, was infinitely harder. The task before Lemuel Thorne was ultimately more difficult than the one before Shem Zenos.

  And, unexpectedly, Shin felt a sliver of respect for General Thorne: the leader of insensible, lazy sheep-horse people who had soldiers like Quack-Quack guarding them. That the world was in only two pieces was quite a remarkable feat.

  That afternoon basic training became much more interesting when they began to learn how to use those swords they were so eager to initiate. An older man, a long-since retired master sergeant who still enjoyed running the soldiers through their paces, took their weapons, then handed them back to see how they gripped the hilts. Private Shin took it as he thought he should, but seeing the slight frown of the man, adjusted his grip, twisting his hand just a bit, as if feeling someone else doing it for him.

  The old officer nodded. “Perfect. Spirits of the soldiers guiding you today, boy?”

  Private Shin scowled at the odd comment but knew no response was wanted.

  He was first to mount a horse and charge the dummy made of straw at the end of the field. The task seemed easy enough, and as he made his pass, he sliced the head clean off.

  It was the shouts and exclaims of the training officers and sergeants that caused him to wheel his horse around and return back to the line, worried that he’d done something wrong.

  “How the slag did you do that, Private?” the old master sergeant demanded to know.

  Shin shrugged. “I’m, I’m not sure, sir?”

  “Well, go again! Aim for the heart this time. Go on!”

  That time he sliced the dummy in two. It was only made out of straw. He couldn’t figure out what the big deal was, until he observed the rest of the new recruits struggling to even stay on top of their horses without dropping their swords.

  The old sergeant kept watching Private Shin out of corner of his eye, and after the last soldier tumbled off his horse, never even making it to the new dummy, he strode over to Shin.

  “The spirit of Lieutenant Shin must be with you, boy,” he said in a quiet voice. “I heard he did that his first times, too—destroying the dummy in his first go. I’ve never seen a new recruit match that skill, at least not without the help of the dead soldiers.”

  “Dead soldiers, sir?” Shin dared to ask.

  The old man nodded to the forests behind them. “They’re out there, boy. Some of them good, some of them rotten, some of them lost. But they’re in those trees, and they’re watching us. Sometimes, they even help.”

  That wasn’t the first time Shin had heard someone refer to the “spirits,” and it struck him as odd that for a world that didn’t teach The Writings, there were a lot of people obsessed with what they called “other-natural.” It seemed they wanted something to believe in, something more powerful than themselves.

  The soldiers especially seemed to be hoping for an extra advantage, someone to nudge them in the correct directions, and a few of the recruits glared enviously at him that afternoon after training.

  That night he pondered what he remembered of The Writings, but he was sure there wasn’t anything in there about the spirits of the dead haunting the forests. But the former vial heads certainly believed they did. Apparently the vials made people remember things that never happened, plaguing them for up to a year after they quit taking them.

  So far he hadn’t suffered any long-term effects, unlike some of the other men he trained with. The next morning, one former grassena boy fell to the ground, sobbing uncontrollably about stepping on an insect and taking its life, and later, Quack-Quack, during inspection, burst out laughing because a passing leaf told him a funny story. But there were others, soldiers who Shin didn’t think had ever used the vials, who also thought the forests were haunted.

  That afternoon they learned how to patrol the border near the forests—a useless activity, Shin was sure, because no one ever went in or out. But many of the soldiers became edgy as they passed a fresh spring just inside the tree line.

  “That was where he was, when he left his horse,” one of them muttered.

  “Who?” Shin asked, turning around in his saddle.

  “Seriously? You’re asking me who? Men, he just asked ‘Who?’”

  The soldiers laughed nervously.

  “He is Zenos, Private,” the training sergeant leading their group explained. “The greatest traitor in the world, remember? Slag, you just learned all about him two days ago! His spirit still haunts this forest. He can’t leave it. This is where he was killed by Thorne, and this is where he waits to emerge again to get his revenge. He’s just waiting for a weak soldier to go in so he can possess his body.”

  “But that’s not all of it, sir,” called another recruit. “The colonel wants revenge, too. My grandmother told me that he’s the one trying to leave—”

  “No, it’s supposed to be Zenos,” said another man. “My uncle remembers that—”

  “But I heard it was all of them,” called yet another.

  “It probably is,” yet another man decided. “Just listen to the noises that come out of there! I heard General Thorne took a group of soldiers in there a few years ago trying to find a way through, and they encountered all kinds of evil traps, poisonous gases, and even a patch of extremely hot ground where the Desert of the Dead meets the world. That’s where they are all stuck, trying to leave the Desert to come back to the world.”

  “That’s true. I heard that too. The forest used to be a nice place before the Shins and Zenos were killed. Then it turned evil.”

  “Not quite. It was a little bad to begin with, but after the Shins died it became a lot worse. No one goes in there and comes out normal. That’s what happened to Colonel O
ffra. The forest drove him crazy. He was in there once, for a few days looking for the Shins, and found their bones. He came out crazed and never recovered.”

  Private Shin recalled what Mrs. Yordin had said about the stories and histories at the forts. Several juicy ones were competing for supremacy that day.

  “Hey, quiet for a minute,” a soldier called out, “and you can hear them. That ‘ooohing’ sound? That’s them!”

  And that was all Shin could take.

  “That’s a pigeon!” he scoffed. “Seriously, why would a spirit go ‘ooooo’? What’s the point?”

  “To scare people away,” a soldier scoffed back.

  “But if the colonel wants to possess someone, why would he scare them away?” Shin pointed out. “Wouldn’t he stand in the trees and say something like ‘Come on in, boys—I’ve got bacon’?”

  One of the soldiers chortled nervously. “I might go in for bacon!”

  “Private, are you trying to tell me you don’t believe in the ghosts of the forest?”

  “I’m not sure,” Shin answered the inquiring sergeant, remembering that he had to buy into the stories somewhat in order to appear loyal. “But it just doesn’t make sense. What are they waiting for, if they’re out there?”

  “Then, Private,” the sergeant said before any of the recruits supplied another debatable explanation, “how do you explain the evil of the forest?”

  “It’s always been like this,” Private Shin said. “There have always been mud volcanoes and hot water and whatever. It’s not necessarily evil, it’s just nature being nature. It’s just what the ground is.”

  “Not like this, son.”

  “Are you sure?” Shin pressed dangerously. “What proof do we have?”

  “We have the proof of the man who was in the forest before and after the Shins: General Thorne,” the sergeant declared, sitting taller. “His word is good enough for me. He saw it turn evil, Private. Ask him yourself about it some time. He loves to tell the story.”

  The story. He was supposed to believe the stories, and judging by the glare in the sergeant’s eye, he was moments away from being put on report for insubordination. He had to shut up, he knew that. His typical “test all things” attitude was going to get him shunted straight out of the army if he wasn’t careful. This wasn’t Salem, where possible truths were poked and examined and even dissected before being probationally accepted. This was the world where the man with the most power insisted that you believed what he declared. Simple, tidy, safe.

  Shin decided at that moment to stop questioning everything—at least, out loud—and just listen and accept. He realized that if he wanted to infiltrate the army and expose Thorne for the liar that he was, he needed first to know what all of those lies were.

  He nodded once to the sergeant who had stopped his horse to watch him, the rest of the recruits also eyeing him nervously, wondering what would happen to the private who could never shut up.

  “Sir,” Shin began respectfully, “I look forward to hearing General Thorne tell the tale. When, sir, might we expect the honor?”

  “Soon,” the sergeant said. “He’s expected back in a week or so, and he always looks forward to meeting the new soldiers, especially the ones who have chosen such unfortunate names.” He sneered slightly and started again along the tree line, the rest of the recruits falling in.

  Shin remained silent and listening for the next week, absorbing all he could about the army and its philosophies, and discovering that quite a lot of it was similar to Salem. General Thorne sought to make a world which believed and thought and worked as a well-functioning unit, like the cogs in millworks, fitting and moving in tight conjunction together. The problem was, quite frankly, that the world was simply too stupid to fully grasp the general’s vision.

  Shin could believe that. He’d heard his grandmother go on enough about the shallowness of the world’s schools, and the density of its students, now the leading adults of the villages. On several occasions, Shin was startled to find himself feeling pricks of sympathy for Thorne’s goal, especially when he first began the dull task of patrolling the roads. Citizens couldn’t even be bothered to watch if the way was clear before darting out between wagons, nor did they even think to watch the few children who frequently got lost because their parents became too distracted in a shop.

  The soldiers had to bring every victim to the doctors, break up every fight, and resolve every quarrel, because no one seemed capable of thinking through a problem on their own. And, Shin had to admit, the soldiers had no additional ability, either. Quite frequently, they were in the middle of those conflicts, adding more victims, and contributing to the general disorder they were supposed to be improving.

  Ruling the world was proving to be a nearly impossible task, and Shin was beginning to understand why his grandfather had said no one man was fully capable of doing it. Certainly not Shem Zenos, Shin thought privately.

  By the time General Thorne returned to Edge—Province 8—three weeks later, Shin was growing more intrigued about the character of the man who believed he could conquer and govern the entire world. Several times a day the recruits were told stories about Thorne’s difficult past and celebrated accomplishments, and while Shin was initially dubious, he grudgingly had to admit that some of the tales were likely true. When his fellow soldiers first struggled to wield their heavy swords properly, the old sergeant had them take their weapons in their opposite hands, then told them, “How much more difficult is it now? I want you boys to think about Captain Thorne, the most highly skilled young officer this army had seen in decades, losing the ability of his fighting arm to that lightning blast. He had to relearn every sword and knife skill he already knew, but now for his left hand. If you boys think this task is too difficult, realize that our commander has already done it—twice!”

  Back in his barracks, Shin tried swiping and slashing with his left hand, just to prove to himself that it wasn’t so different. But it was, and again a flash of respect for Thorne surprised him.

  When he heard at midday meal that General Thorne would spend a few minutes addressing the new recruits later, a bubble of eagerness and anxiety filled his gut. He wanted to look Thorne in the eyes to see for himself the man who chased his family out of Edge, who now thought he could wrest the south from Sargon.

  He also wanted Thorne to see him. He hadn’t changed the Shin name patch—although all the other ‘unfortunately named’ soldiers had, Quack-Quack now being known as Private Mallard—because he wanted to observe Thorne’s reaction to the younger version of Colonel Shin. He was hoping Thorne would regard him with respect, and maybe even worry, seeing the resemblance. Most importantly, he was hoping Thorne would be afraid of what he’d see in Private Shin’s eyes, recognizing a man his equal, or even capable of surpassing him.

  The private practiced his steady glare on his mount in the best Shin tradition at the training field that afternoon, but he didn’t realize how edgy the creature had become until he heard the shouts came for recruits to line up: the general was striding toward them. Obediently, Shin stepped into position, holding his horse’s reins tightly. But his mount had other ideas and reared, yanking the reins out of Shin’s hand and bolting for the forest.

  His sergeant spun to Shin, furious. “Don’t go making me look bad in front of General Thorne, boy—GET YOUR HORSE!”

  “Yes, sir!” was all he could respond, torn between wanting to stay to meet the general, but knowing he’d look ridiculous as the only soldier without a mount. He sprinted after his animal which was headed for the fresh spring at the edge of the forest. The horse darted into the safe patch of woods, and Shin hesitated at the tree line, knowing his sergeant was likely still watching him. But he had to get the horse.

  He strode into the sparse trees, grumbling under his breath. “Stupid animal. A Clark would never be so skittish as to hide in the forest—”

  But was struck with the impression—and reminder—that the original Clark loved being in th
e forest. The notion came from the right side of his mind, and he glanced around, realizing that he was in the haunted forest, after all. Who else but a dead colonel would remind him of that horse fact.

  He hesitated to move, his horse shying away from him. Shin knew he was there, his grandfather, as if bouncing eagerly on the balls of his feet, just waiting for his grandson to acknowledge him. Ideas trickled into his brain, that his hand adjusting on the sword, and his deftly destroying the straw dummy weren’t entirely the private’s skill, but the ability of a seasoned general. He hadn’t just inherited Perrin Shin’s ability, he’d inherited Perrin Shin.

  And if he just opened his mouth, just acknowledged his grandfather’s presence and desire to help, he’d be there far more distinctly—

  Private Shin snatched the reins of his horse and pulled the animal from the spring, annoyed at the insinuation that his skill wasn’t entirely his own, and dubious of the kind of help the former colonel would try to offer him.

  Shin clenched the reins more firmly, striding purposefully back to the training field to get away from those thoughts, but instead found himself marching straight into memories. One that flared up before him was watching through the knotholes in the Zenos’s barn as his grandfather and uncle sparred in secret. On more than a few occasions, the men picked up long, thick rounds of wood and battled each other as if they held swords. It was the laughing and shouting that brought their sons and grandsons to spy on them and watch them bruise each other.

  Just as the private wondered why this odd memory was before him, he remembered something: General Shin, tossing his stick into his left hand and swinging it as deftly as if it were in his right. Sergeant Major Zenos did the same thing, lunging and whacking with his supposedly-weaker arm as easily as if it were his dominant.

  They had trained with both hands.

  All soldiers had back then, simultaneously—

  Shin stormed past that memory, pushing through it like an inconvenient waterfall. But he wasn’t sure with whom he was angry: the old sergeant who had made it sound as if Thorne had to relearn all his fighting skills, or the old man trying to show him the supposedly glorious story of Thorne having to learn to fight all over again was a lie.

  There were more memories his grandfather was trying to throw in front of him, Shin could feel it, but he wanted no more images to wrestle with. Besides, they all felt like delaying tactics, trying to keep the private from meeting the general, whose lectures were pointed and brief, and whose time was limited.

  Shin needed to look Thorne in the eyes and see for himself why Colonel Shin was trying so earnestly to keep him away. If he could just face him—

  But to his disappointment, General Thorne, flanked by his guards, was already quick marching to the fort. Shin sagged as he watched Thorne’s back enter the gates a couple hundred paces away. The man was tall and broad—not as large as the former colonel, but formidable in his own way. Curiously, he didn’t wear his cap, as if he wanted everyone to recognize him by his sandy hair, touched with gray highlights that were visible even at this distance. Shin also noticed he didn’t have the regulation short-cropped haircut, but wore his hair longer in the back, a slight wave over his collar, and tucked over his ears in the front. He reminded Shin a little of the paintings of lions he had seen at the university in Salem, with their imposing manes.

  He strode majestically, readily returning a salute with his left arm, as if he’d done that his entire life, and vanished through the gates.

  Shin was struck with an idea that he was sure was entirely his own; both generals, the one in Edge and the one in Salem, had been giving him stories, and neither of them was telling him the entire truth.

  Chapter 27--“The world seems to be heavier for you today.”