“Tie them up, Chass,” the lead woman said. “Tess and I will cover you.”
Rough hands grabbed his and wrapped them in a very scratchy rope. It must have been very new because he could smell the fiber of it. By the time that was done a third vykati had stepped from the shadows: a gray female much smaller than the first.
“Check the tent, Tess,” the leader said.
The smaller of the two women stepped over him and he could hear her cautiously throw back the flap of the tent. “Clear.” Tess responded.
“Chass, you and Tess get the vehicles fired up and their communications device turned off,” she finished. “Check the tent for supplies.”
“Looks like all they had was food.” Tess said.
“Bad food.” Chass answered. The three laughed.
“Ok, listen up,” the leader began. “Chass here ties terrible knots, so you shouldn’t have much difficulty getting them untied if you work together. Once we leave, get yourselves freed and you can follow your tracks back the way you came. I can’t promise you’ll be safe from the natives, but if you run into any, give them this and it might be better for you.” She dropped a piece of cloth to the ground. Dorsla could just barely make out that it was mostly black with some red.
After moving some things around they hopped into the three supply vehicles and left. Dorsla heard Sergeant Frinz move up behind him and after a moment, his bonds fell free. He returned the favor for the sergeant before helping untie the rest of the crew. A quick check showed that they’d taken all the weapons and ammunition, the sleeping gear, and the food.
Dorsla held up the piece of cloth he’d seen fall earlier so Sergeant Frinz could see it. It was a plain black cloth, with the image of a red wolf’s head on it.
“How many were there?” the sergeant asked.
Private Dorsla just shrugged.
One of his fellow crew members piped up, “I only ever saw three,” she said.
Sergeant Frinz glared at Dorsla and the young soldier could feel heat rising in his face. “I didn’t see any others either.” He then realized the depth of what he had just spoken. “I mean, there must have been plenty of others, at least 20 hidden in the shadows. It sounded like it when she howled.”
No one argued with him.
“Not bad for a night’s work,” Tess said to Sajani when they’d gathered together again. “I’m not even sure we needed the rest of the platoon as backup. We might have been able to pull it off with just us three. We could send out three raiding parties a night instead of just going all together and still have people guarding the back.”
It might have been tempting, if Sajani was as young as Tess. The size of their haul was formidable and if they could do three times as much, they would have all the supplies they ever needed in no time. But she worried that word would get out rather quickly about what they were doing and it wouldn’t be so easy once the enemy knew the size of her force for sure. Besides, they almost had enough rifles for everyone now and they did have enough transports. One of the ones they’d captured even had a very large weapon on it that Ginger and his cat were happily dancing about now. She’d been worried the spark would hurt himself or one of her team, so she made him take out all the ammunition first. He was disappointed, but obeyed. His cat had hissed at her.
Tess was busy glorying in the bounty of their labors. She’d taken a ration meal for herself and had been chewing on it periodically. “How do they even eat this stuff?” she said with her mouth full.
Sajani smiled at her. She was about to point out that the younger vykati kept shoveling it into her snout, but thought better of it.
“Where do we go from here, my Lady?” Tess asked between mouthfuls.
Sajani had been thinking about that for weeks and still wasn’t sure. She’d managed to acquire a decent crew and better weapons and vehicles than she’d thought possible to begin with, but she was lacking a definite plan and that bothered her. It wasn’t that privateering was an orderly pursuit, she kept telling herself. She didn’t need a plan beyond harassing the enemy and making it harder for them to reach Vharkylia, but her military background was a strong influence and demanded attention. Even Simon usually had a plan, she thought to herself.
“For now we keep pillaging the enemy,” she said. “I’m sure an opportunity will present itself.”
Captain Hens was tired. She’d been wakened in the middle of the night when a squad of supply soldiers had shown up stripped of weapons and gear. Protocol demanded a debriefing within a day. She’d have given it a day’s time if it wasn’t for the ripples it sent through the supply depot. Sure there had been some casualties so far, but they were mostly limited to rare accidents or a lucky strike from the enemy.
Up until now the Terahns had thrown all they could at the elven forces, hoping that through luck and determination they could dent the juggernaut they’d been facing. This was different. It showed finesse and confidence.
She’d saved Sergeant Frinz for last. “How many of the enemy were sighted?” she asked again.
“I told you ma’am,” the man insisted, “probably about twenty or so. They caught us by surprise.”
The captain let out a long sigh. “Sergeant, I have statements from most of your crew who say they didn’t see any more than three.”
He didn’t miss a beat and that made the captain more suspicious. “They must have been obscured by the light. A group approached in single file. We don’t know how many there were behind. But they did howl and it sounded like there were a lot of them.”
“Yes…” the captain said feigning patience. “And completely surrounded and taken by surprise, you surrendered to this wolf lady.”
“You’ve heard of the Copper Wolf haven’t you, captain?”
“The little flag she left for you?”
Her doubt wasn’t lost on the sergeant. “I’ll take that as a ‘no’,” he said and then continued quickly. “I have a friend on coms with one of the forward units. She said that this wolf lady called them up and demanded to talk to General Sestus. She told him that she killed off a whole squad by herself and that she was coming for him personally. Made the General so angry, he didn’t speak for hours. She called herself the Copper Wolf.”
Captain Hens scoffed at him. “Two important things to note, Sergeant Frinz: General Sestus hardly ever talks. I don’t see how some wild wolf lady would make it any different” She looked the younger soldier in the eye and he looked away. “And more importantly, this is the elven army, mister. We don’t have the luxury of superstition here. We work through science and fact. Not folklore.” She paused to allow that to sink in. “Now is there anything else you want to report?”
“No ma’am,” he said sullenly.
“Then you’re dismissed. Get some sleep, sergeant. It was a long walk I’m sure.” He left the room without saying a word.
Still, the captain couldn’t help but think to herself, his twenty attackers would be much more believable if he himself had seemed to believe it. Three against ten and they surrendered? The general would not be happy about this. Those supplies had been heading to him, so there was no way of shuffling that report outside his field of view. At least, she thought with some measure of satisfaction, it wasn’t her who would have to face him.
“I’d like to send out a couple of scouts before we go,” Sajani was saying. Dusk was just setting in and they were a kilometer or so from their quarry.
“I’ll volunteer,” Chass said quickly.
There was silence among the group for a moment.
“You’re a good soldier, Chass, and I mean no offense,” Sajani said carefully, “but sending you on a scouting a mission seems a lot like sending up a flare and hoping its smoke can hide an elephant.”
No one laughed and Chass looked a little disappointed. Tess helped out, “Actually, I’ll take Chass and Ginger. We should be able to handle any trouble we run into.”
Sajani wasn’t sure what to say to that, but figured that Tess knew what she wa
s doing. “You sure?”
“Yes,” the former sergeant said with conviction. “He might be big, but Chass can move silently and keep concealed with the best of us. He’s our best scout.”
Chass smiled at the compliment.
Sajani thought on it a moment. “That will work. Ginger already knows where you’re going. He’s pretty sure it’s just another set of supply vehicles…”
“I’d say I’m about 85% sure,” Ginger interrupted. “It’s that pesky 15% chance that it’s what they call their behemoths that worries me.”
“Hopefully once we find out for sure…” Sajani started.
“Oh, I’ll know from then on for sure,” Ginger finished. “It’s not a mistake I’d make twice.”
“Good.” Sajani said quickly. “Move on out then. Rendezvous back here in about two hours, even if you can’t make visual contact.”
Tess gave an exaggerated salute and, once Ginger had his cat safely stowed in one of the transports so it would not follow, the three left quickly. They hadn’t yet disappeared into the undergrowth when Doc Cutter approached her. “Hopefully they’ll have some medical supplies on them this time,” he told her.
“We haven’t even touched the ones you deployed with.”
“Oh, not to use them, of course, although extra won’t hurt. I was thinking that Ginger was having too much of the fun with the new stuff.”
“And you’d like to see some of what they have technology-wise?” Sajani said. “I’m afraid it’s probably mostly bandages just like what you’d use.”
“I can hope,” Doc said amiably. “One of the refugees said they had a type of powder they put on wounds to close them faster.”
“Not as fast as one of your spells, I’m sure.”
Doc laughed. “I’m not worried about being replaced or anything. Spells will always be faster, but a powder that can close wounds and can be used by anyone? I have to admit, that’d take a big burden off me. “
“That’s why Ghenis is assigned to you. He can bind up what you can’t spell over.”
There was silence for a moment between them and Sajani was about to leave when Doc spoke very slowly and carefully.
“You do a really good job, my Lady: a really fine job.” His voice was subdued slightly, so that the others crowded around them couldn’t hear. He then turned and walked off.
Sajani wasn’t sure what to think of that, but she let him go anyway. There was plenty to get ready before they left. The soldiers were busy cleaning weapons and packing the vehicles, although some had found time for a couple of rounds of wisp and incant, popular card games among soldiers and con artists. She stopped in on a set of four who were packing up some supplies together to see what was up. They stopped talking when she approached. Three of the four had been issued the new rifles, but one was still using a flintlock.
She held out her hand to the male soldier with the flintlock and he handed it over to her after demonstrating that the chamber was empty by putting a rod down the barrel. She took a few moments and inspected the weapon in silence, “Well done,” she said, handing the weapon back to him.
Ginger had come up with a way to make sure the new rifles weren’t loaded as well and the next soldier pulled back a handle and turned the weapon on its side to show her it was empty. She took the weapon and began inspecting it “My lady,” the soldier asked.
“You did a good job on this as well,” she responded after a moment.
“My lady,” the soldier repeated.
Sajani continued the inspection in silence.
One of the other soldiers prodded the one who had spoken and she again repeated, “My lady.”
Sajani stopped the inspection and looked directly at the soldier. She was young, even younger than Tess and wore her dark brown hair in a ponytail. Her uniform cap was perched somewhat crookedly on her head, but given that none of them were still technically wolf pack soldiers, Sajani didn’t comment on it. She was straining to remember the soldier’s name, but couldn’t. “I’m sorry,” said politely, “I don’t remember your name, soldier.”
“It’s Onha, my lady,” the soldier began, “we wanted to ask you something. She motioned to the others in her group, who nodded their support.
Sajani finished inspecting the rifle and handed it back to Onha. “Ok,” she said simply. It wasn’t that she didn’t usually talk to the soldiers she worked with—she usually did, but there had been so much new information coming in over these first weeks together that she rarely had time to just mingle like she was doing now.
“Will it always be this easy?”
“Easy?” Sajani asked. They thought this was easy?
“Well, the raids we’ve done so far, they seemed pretty scared of you.”
Sajani looked around and noticed that all eyes were on her. They all had this question? Wasn’t it Tess’s job to make sure they knew what they were getting into? No, it was her job. Tess wasn’t their sergeant anymore. Sajani was their sergeant, and their commander. With how young some were, she was also part parent.
“I won’t lie to you,” she said firmly. “Those have been lucky. They should have been much more difficult. I hoped that marching in that way and concealing our numbers would make it safer and it does.” She looked out over the group and met their eyes.
“It will work this time too?” Onha sounded hopeful.
“I hope so, Onha.” Sajani responded truthfully. “But it’s only a matter of time before they figure out that we don’t have that many with us. They are probably going to keep more people on guard now too. Like I said, we’ve been lucky.”
Looking into their eyes, she could see that she wasn’t giving the answer they wanted to hear. What did they want to hear? A lie? Did they expect her to say that they would all come back safely without so much as a scratch on them? It was better they knew the truth up front.
“I never promised that following me would be safe. But this I can promise: we will slow the advance. We will keep our homeland safe.” Many visibly relaxed when she said that. “I will do everything I can to make it as safe as possible for all of us. That’s why I sent out the scouts—to be sure we know exactly what we’re up against.”
“But, the elves, they’re afraid of you,” a soldier near Onha piped up.
“Yes,” Sajani acknowledged. “And we’ll keep it that way as long as we can.”
General Sestus read through the supply captain’s report one more time to make sure that he hadn’t missed any important details. That wolf lady was becoming quite the problem.
Tess peeked out through the underbrush that was concealing them and took another look at the large vehicle parked about a hundred meters away. Unlike the transports, it did not hover above the ground. Instead its wheels moved along two sets of metal conveyor belts, two on each side, that constantly rolled beneath it. Compared to the transports that were near it, it was huge. Between the two sets of belts two parts were stacked. The bottom part looked like it was where people entered. They were discussing what the top part was.
“I was hoping it was just a large transport of some kind,” Ginger was saying. He looked almost comical. He didn’t have a uniform, so instead he’d tied a bandana with the Copper Wolf logo around his head and he carried about a dozen bandoliers and satchels from his shoulders, some empty, but most containing anything from tools to explosives. He didn’t bother carrying a rifle. “But it does seem odd to put your cargo area so far up. Maybe they usually float their cargo like they do their smaller vehicles.”
Chass was also staring up at it. “It has rifles mounted on it like the transports, so I suppose you could be right.”
Tess didn’t feel like waiting around. “I’ll see if I can get a closer look at it.” She had just moved outside the cover of the underbrush when the top part of the large vehicle began spinning towards them. It didn’t have to move far for them to see the very large cannon barrels forming a circle rotating towards them.
“Weapon. Very big weapon.” Ginger said.
Tess had been in the process of moving back under cover when an elf standing near the vehicle sighted her and called out in alarm. “Time to move!” Tess shouted. She let out a war howl that was answered by the other two.
Ginger and Chass wasted no time and started running. Several of the elves tried to recover from their surprise fast enough to shoot, but their shots went wide. “Shouldn’t we return fire?” Ginger asked.
“I think I’d stand a better chance asking them to dance.” Chass responded. He placed his hand on Ginger’s back to encourage the spark to keep running.
They ran a good distance with no more shots ringing out, so Tess decided to chance a look back. When she didn’t see anyone approaching she motioned for the other two to slow down. They ducked behind a tree while she checked behind. The sun had set, but the stars and moons had yet to really take over on the lighting. The elves had turned on their lights. They could see the bright shine in the distance. They were still close enough that they could hear the engines of the war machines.
Tess waited silently and the others said nothing for a long moment. Then she noticed that the light was moving slightly. It seemed to rise and fall and though she couldn’t be sure at first, it seemed to be getting brighter.
“It’s getting louder.” Chass said.
It was. “We need to get back now,” Tess said urgently.
“Will they follow us?” Ginger asked.
“If they know what direction we came from, it doesn’t matter.” Tess answered. “We need to get back and warn the others.”
“If it involves not being here, I’m game.” Chass answered.
“Count me in,” Ginger said quickly.
They ran a little way before the first shot from the cannon exploded in front of them. The smoke and debris stung her eyes, but she could tell that her companions were still with her so she just kept running forward.
“Not sure how you can miss with a gun that big…” Chass started.
“Don’t think about it, just keep moving.” Tess responded.
“It probably doesn’t bother with exact accuracy,” Ginger began.
Wolf's Pawn (Sajani Tails Book 1) Page 12