Faithful

by Michelle Hauck

  In a flash, he flung off the ropes. The body crashed to the ground. Telo knelt beside it and pushed on Ordoño’s chest. In and out. Forcing the air through. The throat was bruised and purplish, but he hadn’t broken the neck. “Breathe, damn you!” To stop the enemy in this way couldn’t be worth it.

  Ordoño’s eyes fluttered. One hand rose to his throat.

  Telo let out a sigh of relief. He hadn’t committed the gravest sin.

  Someone shoved him aside. Santabe stood over him, white Diviner in hand. He’d failed, lost his nerve and let his people down. “Take me, Lord,” Telo said in a rush.

  “The one reasonable thing you tried and you botched it,” Santabe growled. “This is how you kill, weak priest.”

  Telo tried to scramble free, but his back hit the wall. The Diviner came down.

  Telo tensed and forced his eyes to remain open. He would go out aware of his end.

  But the Diviner touched Ordoño. In an instant, the life that had been returning was wiped clean for good.

  “What . . . why . . .” Telo sputtered at Ordoño’s lifeless body. He glanced for Teresa and saw her lying on her face, motionless. He waited for his turn, for the killing touch, but it didn’t come. “He was your—”

  “My lord. My mentor,” Santabe sneered. “He was all that and more. He accomplished what no one else could. He picked me out of the masses to elevate. I’ve sent him to his reward. Spared him the terror to come. He conquered in this life, now he can do so in the next and ensure Dal’s favor.”

  Telo grasped for sense, but the words spun around him. “I don’t understand. Is this because he didn’t rescue you back at our camp?”

  “Bah. I needed no one’s help.” Santabe returned the Diviner to her belt. “Dal has manifested. Five hundred years early, thanks to your witch. Armies don’t matter anymore. Lord Ordoño was made—what is your word—not needed, obsolete, here. I spared him the pain Dal would have inflicted and sent him ahead of me to the next life to take that world as he took this. He would thank me.”

  Telo shook his head, but Santabe wasn’t looking at him anymore.

  “I dreamed of finding a way to convince the Children of Dal to change. Then he came. Like one of your miracles. Don’t you see? The Children of Dal kept Him from the world and protected your kind for centuries past remembering. Now we are free of that and Dal is free to take the world. It will die in blood and pass to the next stage where we all begin again. To strive to rise to the top. If only I were favored to go with Ordoño, as worthy as he. But is that right? Is Dal done with him here?” She fingered the red Diviner. “Maybe . . .”

  Telo couldn’t speak. The woman stunned him. She acted as unstable as others accused Ordoño of being.

  “Were the sacrifices—executions—to call your god or to hold him at bay?” a weak voice asked. Teresa had sat up, holding her head with one hand.

  Santabe snapped out of her thoughts and stepped in Teresa’s direction. “She understands. A compromise of both. Years ago, His leadership split, some arguing one way and some the other. We spilled enough blood to keep Dal happy and to create new Diviners.”

  “So—” Teresa began.

  “Enough questions!” Santabe snapped, hands held over the Diviners at her waist. She fingered her second earring and looked at Telo. “I owe this to that one. For that, I let you go, this one time. Don’t think it a kindness. You don’t deserve to go to your reward. I will tell the guards to take you to the edge of camp. Go and suffer Dal’s wrath. Watch this world fall.”

  She actually went to the door and spoke in their language to a guard, though hiding Ordoño’s body with her own. Telo flexed his hand and thrust his aching stump into his armpit. He would live. If Santabe had given her word, she would keep it. His eye slid over the body. His task was accomplished without the blood on his hands. Yet, he’d never felt more wretched in his life. It had all gone horribly wrong.

  He used the wall as support to reach his feet. Teresa took his arm and pulled him along. He couldn’t begin to guess how the army would react to Santabe. Could she gain control or would they fall apart as he hoped? Somehow, he didn’t think she’d even try to command them. She seemed so sure she didn’t need to act. What did it mean?

  He glanced back. Santabe smiled widely from the doorway, now holding the red Diviner. “Our killing before today was a raindrop in a hurricane to what will come, priest. Remember that and fear. Your kind god will not save you now.”

  Chapter 34

  Over the three day march to Aveston, Julian had tried hard not to dwell on how the battle would start—gallant dashes, sneak attacks—he left planning to the experts. A wise choice from a cautious man. All good decisions to the side, he hadn’t anticipated both sides forming up into neat ranks while facing off across the large empty field in front of Aveston’s walls. There couldn’t have been any lead-up more dull, more anticlimactic, than this careful maneuver in full view of the Northerners—both sides showing exactly how their forces would be deployed, able to fully weigh and measure their opponents. From his location with the pelotón captains on a knoll behind and separate from the arranged ranks, Julian had the best view of all. As the captains and their lieutenants discussed strategy, and messengers and runners came and went, he was left to be an observer on the crowded hilltop.

  Julian expected rushes of emotion. Determination. Bravado. Even fear. Not this cerebral planning, with all the excitement of a safe and controlled game of Acorraloar. Yet . . .

  The air fairly crackled with tension. Salvador would call it the feel of a bent bowstring—full of anticipation and possibility—alive and bursting with static energy beneath the surface. Men would die today. Win or lose, and much as they tried to forget the fact, they discerned some would not survive to see the sunset. Nerves and hearts beat with the knowledge they could be among the dead. The goal of the battle aimed to save the whole at the expense of losing the individual. The transience of life made Julian sit taller, clasp the reins of his horse with more awareness, feel every breath, and savor every second.

  In this moment of stillness, he felt his own mortality stronger than ever before. On his shoulders rode the knowledge that all the lives lost here today would be by his order. If he let it, that weight would suck the strength from his body and lucidity from his soul. He touched mind, heart, liver, and spleen. A man could only do his best and pray it was enough. However, no internal command to relax could convince his hands not to sweat and his pulse not to throb.

  By the saints, he wished it would start so it could be over.

  The desire to scream and break the stillness or simply flee built and built in his chest.

  As if sensing he and everyone else had reached their limit of endurance, the cluster of pelotón captains broke apart, some jogging their horses back to their units, others remaining on the hill where they could better make adjustments to the battle as it progressed. Captain Muño brought his horse beside Julian, sitting companionably in silence, though surrounded by others. Acquainted for years, since Salvador had raised Muño as an enlisted man from the ranks to be his lieutenant, Julian felt a new intimacy and closeness with him that could only come from the nearness of death. So this is why Salvador had had such devotion to his men.

  “It begins soon, sir,” Muño said, gesturing to a uniformed man on foot, holding a mass of flags, and struggling to climb a raised wooden platform. “Watch.”

  Julian couldn’t have torn his eyes away if the sky fell on him. As the most junior captain, Muño was almost as much an observer as himself, no doubt assigned as nursery keeper over the one civilian there.

  “There is no reason to ‘sir’ me,” Julian said. “The vote must have taken place. I’m likely no longer alcalde, just a civilian now.”

  “That would not be the case if the pelotónes were there to vote, sir.”

  “I thank you for that, though not a one of us would change our positions and be at Crueses to keep me in power when we are needed here—least of all I,” Juli
an said unhurriedly, then turned the conversation from the painful subject. The raw stab in his heart told him exactly how much he would miss being their leader. “I didn’t anticipate the buildup to the fighting would be such a slow process.”

  “Slow?” Muño huffed with a short laugh. “This has been quick—it usually takes days—but wait, soon it will move like lightning—and as unpredictably.”

  “Will it go our way?” Julian asked and then cringed. Such negative talk must be in poor taste, but his companion took it with ease.

  “They outnumber us. Their long pikes offset our horses. They have more archers than we expected. It depends on Aveston. Will they join as planned? There’s plenty of activity atop their walls. They’ll do something, but mayhap too late for us, sir.”

  Julian grunted. That had been his part to play, and he knew exactly how tempestuous their relationship had always been with their nearest neighbor—sometimes allies and more often adversaries over border disputes and trade differences. A common enemy didn’t mean Aveston would act in Colina Hermosa’s best interests.

  The flagman fidgeted, readjusting his bundle of flags to ready one uppermost. Julian leaned forward and felt a corresponding stir across the leagues of space between them going through the ranks of men.

  “There’s something I should have said, sir,” Muño began, “but never found a good time. Ramiro. Is he off on a mission for you? Are there circumstances I don’t know behind his desertion?”

  Julian’s gaze jerked from the flagman to stare at his captain, thoughts rushing, then settling as hope flared. “Have you heard some news?”

  “That I have not. But if . . . when he returns there must be a trial. Unless you can prove otherwise—if he had a reason to be gone. Secret orders?”

  Julian hesitated, the desire to protect and defend strong. Beatriz would not have deliberated—her baby came first. At the same time . . . Would Ramiro’s pride thank him for lying? Did false words do his son favors? “He did not have any such orders. But I trust my son’s judgment. He left for a good reason.”

  Muño nodded, looking unhappy. “The men of our unit see Ramiro as their own son. But the law is the law. It will have to go to trial.”

  Julian was flooded with memories of a young Ramiro tripping underfoot of the men, following after his brother, begging to try their weapons, and the men treating him like an endearing puppy. Tears filled Julian’s eyes as he turned back to the flagman. To think it would come to this . . .

  “I owe your family much,” Muño continued. “Born in the slums. Just a sergeant. Invited into your home. Salvador may have raised me, but you all made me. By my honor, I cannot . . . I cannot . . .”

  Julian knew of the discrete lessons in reading and writing that had brought Muño up to officer material when Salvador decided this man had to be his lieutenant. He had pulled some strings himself to get Muño in the university to audit courses on warfare and strategy.

  “Show favoritism?” Julian supplied. “I understand, Captain. Salvador made a strong choice. My son recognized a leader of men when he saw one. He was a good judge of character. We were happy to help you.” Julian clapped him on the shoulder. “I do not expect you to do anything that isn’t your duty, nor would Ramiro.”

  “I thank you again, sir. Serving under your son was a privilege.”

  From the corner of his eye, Julian caught movement from the remaining captains on the hilltop, and the flagman raised high a brilliant blue flag and let it drop. Beside him, Captain Muño stood in his stirrups. Julian tried to do the same and nearly overbalanced onto his ass. He settled for a half stand in time to see the church’s pelotón sweep forward in a charge; the long lances that were their claim to fame set and braced against their saddles. By tradition, the opening of any battle went to them.

  Scores of arrows flew, some finding a mark and most bouncing from armor. Men and dappled-gray horseflesh crashed against the Northerners and cleaved through like water—until they struck a square formation of Northern pikes braced to meet them. Then the orderly charge dissolved into a chaos of stabbing and falling, blood and death and horses screaming. At the same time, dozens of other units surged forward, the orange and white of Crueses among them. The Northerners reacted in kind, running forward in some spots, staying put in others. It broke down into a huge flow of motion to Julian’s untrained eye, which sometimes surged here or there. The flagman continued to give signals that meant nothing to him, putting fresh units in play.

  Muño grunted, and Julian resisted the urge to tug at his arm. “It goes well?”

  “As expected. Decidedly even.”

  Julian tried and failed to detect that in the masses of men, striking and counter-striking at each other. To him it looked like a kicked anthill—the neat, straight lines all dissolved. Here, sections of it seemed to move in their direction, while there it went the opposite way, but in most places the tide held ground. A unit of horses swung around and hit one such bulge, knocking it back. At their distance, he couldn’t distinguish who fell or the extent of the injuries. There was no smell of blood, no whimpers of the wounded—except for the death shrieks of horses, he could have been watching a game or training exercise.

  It felt wrong to be here—safe—when so many perished in his cause. His promise to Beatriz stung and then subsided. She was right. His left arm shook. Even if his hands had their full strength, they were too old for this fight. He contributed in other ways.

  His eyes shot to the gates of Aveston and detected nothing changed. They remained shut fast.

  “All the reserves are committed,” Captain Muño commented.

  Julian knew the doom of that. A glance at the flagman showed him with a white flag uppermost in his arms, ready to be displayed. No. No. No. Not yet! Julian’s fingernails bit into his flesh. The captains would only agree to his plan with a contingency: If Aveston failed to act in time or casualties mounted too high, they would break away and use the speed of their horses to retreat. The thought brought bile to Julian’s mouth.

  To give up when they were so close.

  Common sense said the captains were right. With ninety-five percent of their fighting men here, they couldn’t afford a catastrophe. The men of Colina Hermosa must live to fight another day—even if it meant defeat. News of a handful of missing scouts long overdue had jarred the captains, making them even more anxious as they had no word of the main Northern army. Only fast-talking about the timeline had convinced them to commit at all. The military leaders would have little patience.

  He stared at the gates along with everyone not directing the battle. As the minutes ticked by, Julian urged them to open with every fiber of his being until sweat beaded on his forehead. Now! Let it be now!

  And still the men of Colina Hermosa and Crueses fought and died alone.

  Minutes inched by to more men dying. Just a little longer. Surely, Aveston would come.

  “The white flag,” Muño said as the flagman held it high.

  “Wait!” Julian cried. He put heels to his horse and bolted to the other captains. “Just a little longer! They will come!”

  “It’s too la—”

  “The gates!” the flagman shouted. Julian spun to see the white flag flutter and fall to the ground, tossed away and replaced again with the bright blue.

  The gates of Aveston had cracked, great metal doors ratcheting up into the walls. Legions of horses raced outward to cross the field with manes and tails flowing. Julian shouted until his voice cracked, joining the bellows from a thousand other throats. He whooped with joy, a grin splitting his face, like he hadn’t smiled in an age of days. All around him normally upright and dignified captains pounded upon each other’s backs, unrestrained.

  Aveston had answered the call. They hit the Northern ranks like a summer flood, pushing all before them.

  As the Northerners were pressed across the field toward the olive groves, Julian wiped at suddenly blurry eyes. Circumstances had gone wrong for so long, it had seemed as if God abandoned
them. To finally have something go right . . .

  Julian laughed aloud as Muño seized his hand and tried to shake it out of its socket.

  A young messenger tugged at his leg. “Sir! Sir!” He held out a folded paper. “For you, sir!”

  The paper with his name uppermost held familiar writing. Julian unfolded it and ripped the paper around the seal in his haste, heart in his throat. Had something gone wrong? He should never have let himself celebrate. It was sure to provoke God to send a defeat.

  My dear Husband,

  I take up my pen to remind you of your promise to avoid any fighting. But I’m sure you are much too wise to hazard any such thing.

  Julian shook his head. Beatriz could have been right there before him. He could picture her accusing face set just so as if she were actually present.

  I’m afraid you will be much annoyed with me, dear husband. The vote has taken place with most astonishing results. But I must go back.

  With half an eye on the turn of the battle—Muño would alert him if anything changed—Julian groaned and shuffled through the pages, before returning to his spot. Beatriz tended to ramble in her letters.

  I did as we discussed and most judiciously released into certain channels the exact terms of the Northern surrender that Alcalde Juan had been withholding from his people. Such news quickly made the rounds and, indeed, exceeded my expectations—actually causing a literal firestorm at one point—as a certain inn caught fire and burned to the ground, during some protests. I considered restitution but thought it better to cling to plausible deniability.

  Julian rolled his eyes. Her gossip outdid itself apparently.

  But certain sources saw through my denials. I mean to say, Alcalde Juan made some rather harsh statements, and might I say, they devolved into quite personal attacks against your wife. He was most venomous and insinuated I was not a lady, nor was my birth legitimate.

  “Lady” had been underlined three times. Julian knew exactly which insult must have incensed more.