Forest For The Trees (Book 3)

by Damien Lake

  Marik held little hope on that dice roll.

  Of the many soldiers he had met, the few who stood above the rest only came to the mid-C Class range if held against the Crimson Kings’ standards. The truly skilled tended to be affable sorts, seeing the men under the clothing rather than separating out the Clean Uniforms from the Ragged Ruffians. As for the rest, army training consisted solely of set routines, when training edicts were enforced at all.

  And those substandard D Class soldiers were the survivors. What would he find in a camp of runny-nosed idealists who had yet to have the mists blown from their eyes by hard combat?

  He would have to check with Dietrik and ask his ex-army friend what percentage of recruits survived their first battle.

  Except any number Dietrik gave would be inaccurate, wouldn’t it? The type of fighting his old division had bloodied their noses on was light skirmishing against Perrisan raiders, irate nobles whose neighborly conflicts had spiraled beyond control, unusually well-organized bandit gangs, the odd pirate making landfall off the Stygan Gulf, and foreign border lords who thought they could surreptitiously annex extra land as they saw fit.

  Could these fresh fish possibly maintain any level of professionalism when they were hurled into a pitched battle against terrifying monsters unleashed by their queer masters? Or would they bolt, running hells-bent for the horizon?

  Too many questions. Unfortunately, he suspected he already knew the answers to this particular set.

  Flying…in the air…

  Marik shuddered when he realized he had stopped in the roadway once again. Whenever he successfully concentrated on what his next step should be, his mind invariably returned to that view and its terrifying implications.

  He could conceive no basis by which to measure the incredibly airborne mountain. It was far too large for the mind to grasp. By the standard of the Stoneseams, the peak would be relatively small, lost among the towering brethren surrounding it. By the standard of a town, it would be a question of whether the term ‘city’ was adequate, or if new terminology should be created especially for it.

  If told in a fanciful bardic tale, he would have imaged a flat bottom, the pinnacle making it triangular overall. The reality bore a shape closer to a child’s rendition of a diamond; two triangles back-to-back.

  Had they carved the pointed base from the ground through whatever unimaginable magic had raised it into the skies? Or had they searched until they found a small enough mountain which, in truth, was closer to a half-buried boulder? Marik’s guesses were wild, based on nothing, except he felt the first option lay closer to the truth. No power could keep the flying fortress aloft indefinitely. The gaping hole in the ground from whence it had come originally would be the only place they could safely set it down, the molded crater providing a perfect footing.

  Was it possible to move such a hulk without it crumbling to a hundred-thousand pieces? Well, obviously they could, but what about setting it back down without shattering it when the weight redistributed?

  Marik’s fingers scratched through his hair. He squinted one eye closed in a grimace as problems far beyond his learning became apparent.

  The most obvious problem of all was, ‘What is it for? What is its purpose?’ Given the limited resources the enclave had cobbled together for cross-border scrying, it defied the odds that they had seen the damned thing in the first place.

  It clearly moved. Once before the scryers had lost it when it passed beyond the original area from which the anchoring earthen casket had originated. They crossed their fingers, guessed where it might turn up given its observed progress, scryed for over an eightday, then finally found it once it entered the new sector. A sector closer to Galemar.

  Was it heading for Thoenar, the black soldiers intending to drop it on the capitol to behead the ruling government? Would they roll it over the massed armies to destroy all resistance at once? Several argued in favor of that, stating that such a tactic had not been optional against Tullainia. In the beginning, these invaders had attacked in surprise, hamstringing the local forces before they had a chance to unite.

  After a candlemark listening to conflicting theories, Marik had left with a gut suspicion that none of them possessed the slightest idea what any of it meant. Their ideas were strictly that. Ideas. None had foundations in any terrain but wild, unrestrained speculation on a phenomenon their experience insisted must be impossible.

  The floating mountain posed no immediate danger, whatever its ultimate purpose. Everyone agreed on that much. Its speed, which changed at different times, would keep it from reaching Galemar before six months had passed.

  Breakfast would be long over if these recruits were being whipped without mercy to make them follow the army’s typical schedule. Marik expected to see the men running through training exercises when the first hastily-built buildings hove into view. Tents would always, he expected, outnumber the few permanent constructions if this training arena survived after the fighting forces fattened up.

  He bent his concentration on finding Trask, preferably after running down Dietrik. Rather than the captain, when he reached the end of the narrow path guarded by a lone soldier beside the main road, he found a scene unbelievable in its layout. Cork perched on an old stump, a guitar in his hands. He must have swiped it from a recruit since Marik knew the man had not brought it with him from Kingshome.

  Marik had never particularly liked the sounds created by the instrument, favored, and probably created by, the Vyajjonese. The lute’s sweeter voice appealed to him far better. That Cork could play it in the first place, and play it well, came as a mild surprise.

  Far more surprising was the minor court surrounding Cork’s ankles. No less than thirty recruits, younger than Cork, crouched on their ankles, hearkening to the man who could never be satisfied unless he was on top. Or perceived himself to be.

  Their eyes were wide in nervous hunger, resembling nothing so much as children frightened by a tale of local haunts, yet eager to hear further details. Given the demonic leer twisting Cork’s face, that might not be so far from the truth. His fingers strummed out somber chords that evoked a feeling of shadows and things creeping along the ground. For all that, the notes were hardly laborious, coming at a smooth, steady rhythm that kept his fingers working.

  “Their demon eyes will mark you,

  “Searing through your soul.”

  Cork swung his head from one side of his audience to the other, his visage resembling a mad tax collector who enjoyed breaking the despondent with his financial power. He strummed several suggestive chords between each line.

  “Their arms swings easily,

  “Then all your friends heads’ roll.”

  He picked out the youngest in the crowd, staring deep into the frightened eyes.

  “Tumbles and rolls.”

  His voice, amazingly sonorous with a deep timber, caressed the last word. Cork slowly allowed his gaze to travel from eye to eye.

  “Their heads always roooo-ooooll”

  “Demons collecting the doomed who,

  “Will be joining with them,

  “Down in the depths of the hells where,

  “They will sing an eternal Chorus of,

  “Dam-na-tion.”

  It raised the hairs on Marik’s neck. Cork could leap forth with the spookiest intonations when he wished. Once before his earnest ‘quoting’, which he’d probably spun out from whole cloth, had stuck in Marik’s head and refused to leave him be. That had been on this same subject, with Cork insisting the monstrous beasts the black soldiers controlled were actually demons in Vernilock’s service, in charge of overseeing a sinner’s eternal torture.

  When Cork started a new verse, this one describing in lyric form what happened when a beast got its teeth into a man, Marik abruptly realized what the damnable man was doing. These were the men who likely would be key elements against the invaders when the fighting resumed!

  “Hey!”

  Heads shifted to face the intr
uder. Marik, conscious of his senior position in the Fourth Unit to Cork although they were both simple frontline fighters, changed his instinctual movement of fists balled against his hips to a non-committal crossing of arms over chest. Cork’s fingers slowed before they altered the tune to simple strumming.

  “Oh, Marik! Damn, I guessed wrong.”

  “Wrong? Tell me what that’s supposed to mean.” Marik spoke to his fellow mercenary over the squatting men, ignoring the green crop.

  “It’s just that everyone was wondering where you’d gotten off to. Now I owe Talbot a quarter-silver.”

  Exactly what fate Cork might have placed his faith in, and coin on, Marik ignored for the present. Although he already knew perfectly well, he asked, “What were you singing a moment ago? I don’t believe I know that one.”

  Cork ran off several quick plucks on the strings. “I put it together personally,” the man replied, pride filling his voice. “I’ve always been good at it. In fact, a song I thought up once got so popular in my hometown, they still sing it every Summerdawn! It all depends on the differences between the chords leading from the last notes in the first riffs and the first notes in the following stanzas. Once you’ve got the timing—”

  “Fine!” Marik barked the word forcefully, knowing that Cork responded to little short of a cliff collapsing nearby if he got into his stride. “That’s fine! But was that about the mon—uh, the beasts?”

  “Sure is! Captain Trask has been asking us to tell the trainees everything we can about the demons we fought.”

  “They aren’t demons.”

  Cork raised one eyebrow in a deliberate show of skepticism.

  “They aren’t demons, Cork! Or Devils, or any sort of hell-creature. Only animals the black soldiers harnessed.”

  “Animals. Right.” The man’s face belied the words, telling the recruits that they should know which of them knew better.

  “You can’t kill a demon with a sword,” Marik insisted, wondering, as he pulled the words from the air, if they held any truth. “A sword wouldn’t so much as scratch them. Or a crossbow either. You know well enough that the beasts we fought can be killed. It takes a little more effort than killing an ordinary foe, that’s all.”

  “Yeah, if you’re used to fighting bears and knights, maybe.”

  Marik wanted to slap the man for being so obstinate in front of the green fighters. “Where is Trask anyway? I need to speak with him. And Dietrik.”

  “The captain usually wanders all over the place. Keep moving and you’ll run into him sooner or later. We’re camped on the other side of the kitchen building.” A gesture with the guitar neck pointed the way. When Marik started in that direction, Cork resumed talking to his clique. “See? Listen to me. I’ll teach you everything you need to know. You can’t afford to go into denial once you’re face-to-face with the nightmares.”

  Annoyance swelled behind Marik’s breast. Over his departing shoulder, he tossed back, “By the way, Cork. You’d better ask Lieutenant Fraser if the re-evaluations are still going to be held. I know you survived the winter, but if you haven’t improved your swordwork, you still might be kicked out of the band.”

  He refrained from looking backward to see what effect his words might have wrought.

  Around the building Cork had gestured to he found the campaign tents that belonged to the army. Assigned to the mercenaries for the duration they served alongside the soldiers, each compact canvas pocket slept four. Marik and Dietrik currently shared their tent with Chiksan and Talbot since decamping from the Southern Road. The task of carrying the bedamned heavy bundle in addition to his personal pack alternated according to who lost the straw-pull each morning. Toward the end, Talbot had been making his suspicions plain that the pull might be rigged, seeing as he ended up hauling it as much as the other three combined.

  The tents were abandoned. Marik easily found his, owing to the minor tear in the flap down by the corner. Dietrik’s pack, as familiar as his own, sat in one corner beside his. He briefly checked his pack before returning to the search, carrying only his sword.

  Aside from Cork’s small group, the recruits were all active at various efforts. The field, surrounded by trees yet still large enough to make Marik think it could easily hold Kingshome, had been divided into roughly a dozen areas. Most were still thick with wild grasses or weeds, though one looked so churned that a plow must have been at work on it.

  As a training facility, Marik gave it low marks. Kingshome’s variety of terrain had no counterpart here.

  Solitary men were rare. Groups were moving according to differing priorities in every open stretch. Some were in lines, each man holding a sword, matching the movements of a lone figure who led them through fighting drills. Others were divided, their halves engaging each other in mock battles. A larger group jogged with heavy packs on their backs around the tree-lined perimeter.

  Not one mercenary joined them. Marik quickly found the Fourth Unit scattered at leisure around roughhewn logs forming the crude lookout tower’s base. He would have seen them before except a building had blocked his view of the spot from where he entered the camp. Wyman looked back at him noncommittally, his coin following a ceaseless arc from his thumbnail through the air. Young Churt glared, crossbow leaning on his knee, his own coin rolling across his knuckles with far greater alacrity than Marik had yet seen him manage.

  While Marik’s eyes picked through the other men, a punch against his left shoulder blade made him spin.

  “Damn it, Dietrik! That actually hurt!”

  Dietrik matched the younger archer’s forceful expression. “Too bad for me, then, mate. I was hoping to bludge on you until you got the point.”

  Marik scowled. “Don’t blame me for things that aren’t my fault! I didn’t expect to be gone so long.”

  “I can imagine. No word at all, and you off with your punchbunny for days while we wonder if you were tossed into a jail cell.”

  “Punch…I wasn’t with Ilona!”

  “No?” Dietrik sounded extremely skeptical.

  “I don’t even know if she’s returned to Thoenar yet! I haven’t had a chance to check.”

  “What in perdition have you been about then? Trask has refused to say word one, if he knows anything about it in the first place. If you weren’t playing foxes and foxholes with your lady, then tell me where you got off to. Sloan is about as informative as a stone, Kineta doesn’t want to talk about men outside her unit and Fraser about bit my nose off!”

  “Relax, Dietrik. We’re still in this together.”

  His friend’s tone caught Marik off guard…except he knew the source behind it. Dietrik’s confidence had been shaken badly during the last season. At one time, or one time only that Marik knew of, Dietrik had seriously considered quitting the band, leaving to find safer employment. He would never admit to such, but Marik believed Dietrik had no desire to stay in the band if he were going to do it solo. A close friend’s presence would have a significant effect on the decision whether to continue over the rough course or not.

  Dietrik had retained his professional bearing, cloaking any worry he might have felt under the sterner attitude he’d adopted since their time in the Rovasii. “Well?” he demanded when Marik remained in his silent thoughts. “I am not your bloody mother, but as your best mate, I deserve to know when you plan to hare off for a few days’ lark and leave me juggling green army fish pestering me for a thousand details. Especially when they all want to know about you.”

  “Me?”

  “Cork has been spread tales left and right, as usual. And he is not the only chap doing it.”

  Before Marik could begin swearing coherently, an approaching presence from behind made him spin. Trask walked with purpose, pebbles and dirt clots scattering every time his boot toes kicked forward. He looked distinctly odd to Marik without the pair of aides who had perpetually hovered by his shoulders during the war.

  Trask lifted a single paper sheet that was folded in half, hiding its co
ntent. “I received this from the council yesterday afternoon,” he declared in his typical tone, an inch short of irritation. “And I have to say I’ve got questions.”

  Marik could guess what Trask had been informed of. “Don’t worry, captain. They don’t mean anything by it. They only want the best picture they can get of where they stand.”

  “What I find most interesting is that I’ve never received a single inquiry about any report I’ve delivered. You want to tell me what’s been lacking in them?”

  “Nothing, as far as I know,” Marik replied quickly. Dietrik’s confused expression bounced back and forth between the men. “Look, captain…let’s talk, all right? I don’t like this any better than you, but that doesn’t change the fact that the king has made up his mind and we’re stuck with it.”

  “Has he?” Trask barked the sarcastic rejoinder. “If the king has decided anything, then it’s news to me.” He waved the paper as if warding off flies. “Let me fill you in on a fact or two. Most of these men still haven’t finished the basic training. Setting up a frontline with them against the Noliers will be handing the blue bastards the keys to the castle. They couldn’t ask for a weaker point to break through. Not only that, half of these men joined on the promise of steady pay and meals! Find one in the tournament lot willing to lift a shovel and I’ll eat my scabbard.”

  “If they are sent anywhere in the next month captain, it will be toward Tullainia, not Nolier. As for which recruits are worth the bother…that’s one of the matters I need to talk to you about. I need to get your feel for what they can do, or if they can be relied on.”

  “You can rely on them to complain about any effort more strenuous than lifting a spoon to their lips,” Trask spat. “But why are you the jilly asking the questions?”

  Dietrik looked as interested in the answer as Trask. Marik answered with, “Mostly because I fought the invaders and their beasts four separate times.” That left a multitude of related questions unanswered, yet he wanted to avoid discussing the details in public. The seneschal’s admonishments were still weighty in his ears. To keep the verbal ball rolling, he continued in the same breath by adding, “How far along in their training are they? Do they have any skill with their weapons yet?”