The Falcon in the Barn (Book 4 Forest at the Edge series)

by Trish Mercer

  Content that the field of battle was deserted except for the dead, Perrin quietly clucked to his able horse and set off for the crater that used to be a building.

  ---

  “Come on,” one man in green mottled and brown clothing whispered to another. He glanced up nervously at the burning timbers above. Ash and sparks floated down, singeing their clothes with tiny holes. “We need to get out of here!”

  “But Dormin, where’s he going?” asked his companion. “Shin’s headed the wrong way! He should be going out, not back into Moorland. We should do something.”

  “You’ve done enough!” Dormin hissed in his ear. “I can’t believe he didn’t see you.”

  His companion flushed with the growing heat and embarrassment. “I couldn’t help myself. There he sat on his horse peering in, and the next thing I know, I’m saluting him.”

  “You’re not the first one to do that,” Dormin said, dragging him away from the flames and deeper into the forest. “I was surprised too. It’s been decades since I’ve seen Relf’s sword. I admit I felt the urge to salute as well. However, those who do so are usually hidden well away in the forest, not under burning embers threatening to expose them to his view!”

  The other man blushed deeper. “I just didn’t expect to see him. He’s not supposed to be here, you know.”

  “Yes, we know,” Dormin said, deftly winding his way along invisible paths, his companion struggling to keep up. “But beyond that tree line is no longer our jurisdiction. We accomplished what we came to do, and now it’s time for use to melt back into the forest.”

  The second man followed him obediently, constantly looking back at what used to be Moorland.

  “But where is he going?”

  ---

  What used to be the village green was eerily quiet.

  The fire traveled north through the forest, since there was little left to burn in Moorland. Yet still a few stubborn logs and planks refused to give up, and lit the way to the massive hole.

  About a hundred paces away from the crater was a tree still standing. Well, significant parts of it were. Perrin tethered his remarkably calm horse to the remaining trunk before picking his way through the debris. He slowed as he neared the pit that now had only a fine wisp of smoke rising from it. The smell of sulfur still hung in the air, as well as a faint scent that reminded him of urine.

  He crept over to the edge of the hole and peered in. The ground all around was relatively smooth, as if an enormous spoon had scraped out the contents in one scoop. He looked around the perimeter and noticed that the remains of the building were scattered from the crater in an almost uniform manner, with black lines and ash radiating outward.

  Perrin kneeled on one knee, scraped up some of the black powder, and sniffed it. Definitely sulfur—

  And then he understood.

  He scrambled to his feet, panic rising and his lungs gasping for air.

  They were trying to harness the power of the forests—

  They were trying to make their own eruptions—

  And they had succeeded.

  He took a few stumbling steps back, his breathing rapid and shallow. If they could do this amount of damage here . . .

  Images flashed across his mind that he couldn’t stop. All that he’d successfully fought for more than two moons was back, forcing him to see all new horrors.

  Exploding eruptions in Edge. At the fort. His home. His family.

  A sharp pain stabbed him in the chest, as if the knife he nearly plunged there was sticking out of his heart.

  Perrin twisted away from the crater, closed his eyes, and gripped his head. “No, no, no,” he told himself, “Not real. Not happening anywhere else but here. You did it. You killed them. You killed them all. They killed themselves!”

  Perrin fought to breathe more slowly, more meditatively. Feeling something hot near his feet, he opened his eyes to see a log smoldering by his boots. Another smell reached him.

  The object wasn’t a log.

  “NO!” Perrin cried as nausea wrenched his stomach. Images clouded his vision, and he sprinted from the crater to his horse, leaping over debris and other objects he chose not to identify. He yanked the reins off of the tree and scrambled on to his steed. The pain in his chest intensified, and he pushed on his heart in a vain attempt to slow its beating.

  “No, no, no. Only happening here. Get away from it! It can’t follow you,” he told himself as he kicked the horse and rode as fast as he dared from the village. “You killed them all. You didn’t even get a scratch! Mahrree will never know.”

  Tears of pain and worry streaked down his face.

  “Dear Creator!” he whimpered as his horse headed into the darkness unguided. It was all the prayer he could muster. For several minutes the horse galloped while Perrin tried to ease the thumping of his heart. Completely disoriented and feeling a sufficient distance away from the horrors, he finally reined his horse to a stop and closed his eyes.

  “It’s gone. It’s gone. It’s far behind me,” he mumbled, trying to convince himself that was true. He focused on a point just above his heart where over a year ago he felt his parents for the last time. “I’m alone. I was victorious. I was right. They were doing worse things than raising an army. I stopped them. It’s over. I’m a son of the Creator—”

  His horse pawed the ground restlessly as Perrin continued to breathe and think and murmur to himself.

  Eventually he opened his eyes. To his right he saw the burning forest in a distance, and he turned the horse around to face the east where Edge, the camp, and the sun would be. He sighed and looked up at the stars.

  “Dear Creator, I need help. You know it, and I’m asking—”

  He lowered his head, ashamed at trying to command the Great Commander.

  Penitently he slid off the horse, went immediately to his knees, but then collapsed on the dirt with his cheek against the earth. There he laid, exhausted and terrified—maybe for minutes or maybe for hours—before he found the strength to speak.

  “Dear Creator, please, please help me,” he whispered. “I know I’m not worthy of Your attention. This ground below me trembles when You command it, but when You cause me to tremble I demand a reason for it. I’m lower than this dirt, but still I beg for Your mercy. I’ve tried to do Your will. I know You wanted us to make this attack, to destroy whatever it was they were trying to make. But Creator, it’s now destroying me. I can’t shake the images—”

  He gasped and shuddered as they flooded his mind again. “Mahrree!” he whispered and squeezed his eyes shut.

  It was another horribly long minute or hour before he continued.

  “Please help me hold it together. My friends are injured, my brother had to end lives, and our leadership is compromised. I don’t know who’s left and able to lead these soldiers home. Please help me get myself together, get the men back, and get me home. You’re the only one in charge, You’re the only one with real power. I’m at Your mercy. Help me finish Your will.”

  He blew out another deep breath and felt his lungs fill again, but something else filled him too.

  The warmth that always remained near his heart grew. A smile came across his face, but he didn’t know why. And he didn’t have to know why—he just needed to accept it.

  Breathing became easier and the pain in his chest faded. Clear images of what needed to happen in the next several hours came to his mind, as if he were seeing vivid drawings in a book. And with that came the desire to get up and get to work.

  Never before had he sighed so loudly or with such gratitude. Once again he was full and strong and unstoppable. He was back.

  Perrin got to his knees, brushed the dirt from his cheek, and addressed the stars. “Well done, Sir! Thank You!”

  Grinning into the dark, he mounted his weary but willing horse, and kicked it into a run to the east.

  ---

  Shem had been growing more uneasy as the darkness in the west revealed nothing but darkness. He and the
rest of the army had returned an hour ago, having found no more Guarders. Moorland and the Guarders were utterly devastated.

  When he strode into the command tent to deliver the good news to the colonel, he was greeted by a lone corporal manning the map.

  Shem helped get the wounded to the surgeons while always watching the west. He took care of his horse, glancing behind him into the dark. He discussed the next moves with Fadh, who was currently in command since he was the highest ranked officer not injured, while keeping an eye on the glow of the Moorland fires.

  Major Fadh kept vigil too, waiting for Colonel Shin to finally appear. The two men stood together now at the ditch on the edge of the camp, scanning the darkness.

  “Did anyone see what direction he went?” Fadh quietly asked Shem. “It’s been hours now.”

  “The surgeons’ aides thought he was right behind them.” Shem massaged his hands. “Five more minutes, then I’ll go looking.”

  “Take some men with you, Zenos. He wouldn’t . . . he wouldn’t go in to the forest, would he?” Fadh whispered, glancing at the trees burning in the distance.

  Shem stared in the same direction, his worry doubling. “Why would he do that?”

  “Brillen told me that’s how he and Shin first engaged the Guarders, years ago,” Fadh murmured, as if concerned that any of the soldiers keeping a respectable distance behind them might overhear. “You know him better than any of us, Shem. What do you think?”

  Calling him by his first name promoted Shem to Fadh’s equal, and Shem appreciated the show of faith.

  But that was the kind of man Fadh was; he just didn’t know it.

  Besides, considering the amount of officers and older enlisted men wounded, the fact that Perrin was missing, along with Beneff, and that Graeson Fadh had been serving in the army for about a year less than Shem, and that the situation was still considered a battle, Sergeant Major Shem Zenos was likely the ablest senior soldier and therefore in charge of the offensive at that moment.

  But Shem didn’t want that distinction. He only wanted his brother to come back. As he surveyed the burning distance, the awful notion that Perrin might not return entered his mind for the first time.

  “Shem,” Fadh said, searching the dark for movement, “considering his past behavior, maybe something in him snapped and he thought he needed to try going into the forests again.”

  Shem groaned. “This was too much, too soon. I told him I didn’t think he wasn’t ready, but he insisted it had to be now.”

  Graeson Fadh squeezed his shoulder in a brotherly manner, and Shem marveled at the familiarity of the gesture. Then again, Shem knew Fadh well. Actually, he knew men like him very well.

  “I never doubted his timing or his resolve, Shem,” Fadh confided. “Obviously he was right about the attack tonight. I’m just worried now about him.”

  Shem smiled dimly at that. Typical Fadh response. But again, Graeson didn’t know that.

  Shem’s smile dissolved as he realized Graeson likely never would know, and once again the two worlds that Shem tried to keep separate threatened to collide and create a disaster in his mind.

  There were enough disasters tonight already, and Shem knew it was his growing dread for his best friend that currently endangered his own ability to keep his thoughts straight—

  Out of the darkness came the sound of a horse galloping. Graeson gripped Shem’s arm in hope. A large horse with the larger figure of Colonel Shin emerged from the darkness, leaped easily over the ditch, and continued past the two men and into the camp.

  Fadh burst into a grin. “Yes!” He shook Shem’s shoulders enthusiastically and broke into a run after the colonel.

  Shem jogged after Perrin as well, trying to discern his demeanor by the way he held himself. Too many things could have gone wrong. It was too much stimulation for such an imbalanced mind.

  Perrin reined his horse once he was in the middle of the tent village, and soldiers shouted in triumph at their commander. As Perrin wheeled the horse around, Shem caught a glimpse of his face.

  Perrin was smiling.

  No, not merely smiling: beaming, almost glowing.

  Shem halted his pursuit and watched.

  Soldiers were rising to their feet, punching the air, and shouting “Shin! Shin!” Even many of the wounded being tended to on the southern side of the camp were trying to sit up, or shouted from their prone positions. Somewhere Roarin’ Yordin would be smacking the ground, Shem thought with a smile. His smile grew as he watched his friend take the cheers, a little embarrassed by the loud outpouring aimed his way.

  Colonel Shin raised his hand in an effort to quiet their roar, but it only made the men shout louder.

  Shem chuckled as Perrin turned slightly pink. He noticed that even the surgeons were chanting “Shin!” as they wrapped wounds. A few calls of “General!” also punctured the air.

  Shem could only hope that Thorne was already sedated.

  Somehow Perrin spotted Shem in the crowd, and for a moment their eyes met. Only Shem was adept enough at reading Perrin’s face to recognize the shadow of darkness that flickered across it.

  Something had gone wrong, but Perrin was on top of it.

  In fact, right now he was on top of the entire world, with a devoted army to make sure he stayed there.

  “Men, men!” Colonel Shin tried to shout over the chants of “Shin!” that continued to pummel him. “Please! It’s the middle of the night, you know. Some drowsy officer in Idumea’s trying to sleep, and your racket will startle him off of his desk.”

  The shouting dissolved into laughter as the combined armies looked with admiration at the mastermind of the offensive.

  “You’ve all done remarkably well,” he announced to them. “I’m astounded and impressed at our victory. Each one of you will be able to boast to your grandchildren that you were at the Moorland Offensive—the attack that devastated the Guarders, that destroyed their secret weapon, and finally brought peace to our world.”

  That started the cheering all over again, with Colonel Shin vainly trying to quiet it. For once no one felt like obeying the colonel. Then again, the colonel wasn’t ordering them to settle down.

  Shem folded his arms and watched with amused approval. After such a miserable year, Perrin Shin deserved to feel a little success.

  The colonel called again over the shouts of the army. “Now, that’s not to say this offensive was executed perfectly. I’ve discovered deviations to my plan which I’ll discuss with your commanders. However,” he paused as he glanced around at the dirty, burned, and bloodied soldiers that looked up at him with reverent awe, “this isn’t the time for admonishment, but for celebration. Men, I couldn’t be prouder of you tonight. And more importantly, the Creator is pleased with you too. Well done!”

  Before he could direct his horse over to the makeshift stables, he was swarmed with eager soldiers who forgot all protocol and tried to reach up to shake his hand, slap him on the leg, or—more appropriately—salute him.

  Shem grinned at Perrin’s futile efforts to slip away. “Just enjoy the moment, General Shin,” he whispered as the soldiers mobbed him. “And that title is coming, my brother. But I must inform you, it’ll be yours in a way, and at a time, that you’ll never suspect.”

  Chapter 15 ~ “Seeing as how some people weren’t where they were supposed to be . . .”

  Perrin evaluated the eleven men surrounding the map just as dawn peeked over the horizon. Most of them had a couple hours of sleep, but it wasn’t enough. The map was now on the ground of the command tent to afford every man a clear view, with the colonel towering over almost all of them.

  “Look, maybe we should do the briefing individually—”

  “No!” Gari Yordin called feebly from his horizontal position on a litter. He made an attempt to slap the side of the tent in emphasis, but the canvas merely gave way.

  “Sir?” His assistant next to him on the ground held up his hand.

  The major smacked that inste
ad. “Well landed, Burk,” he said, pleased with the smacking effect. He looked up to Perrin who was trying to hide a smile. “We started this together, we finish together!”

  Brillen Karna, also on the ground, nodded wearily. He was propped up against a stump on his left with Shem on his right, who sat next to him as a support. Brillen’s normally light brown face was pale from loss of blood, and his leg was bandaged extensively. Still, he proclaimed, albeit weakly, “Hear, hear!”

  Out of loyalty, the officers’ assistants also sat on the ground taking notes and offering support to their injured commanders.

  Perrin glanced at Graeson Fadh, the only other uninjured officer, standing next to him.

  Fadh shrugged. “Whatever they want, sir.”

  Only a faint moaning sound came from the vicinity of Lemuel Thorne. He was slumped awkwardly on the other side of Zenos, his head propped up slightly against Shem’s arm, but lolling back and forth as he moved in and out of consciousness. Shem leaned toward Brillen in a pretense to help him sit more comfortably, and the young captain flopped to the ground with another groan.

  Shem quickly looked around apologetically at the other soldiers, on his face an overly dramatic expression worthy of the amphitheater that conveyed, Ooh, did I do that?

  Several men snorted.

  Perrin shook his head slowly at Thorne. “How much sedation did they give him, anyway?”

  Shem grinned slyly. “It seems our brave captain has a thing about needles. When he heard how much stitching the surgeon planned to do, he nearly passed out all on his own. He asked for as much sedation as possible so he wouldn’t feel anything for a very long time. That’s why he’s not entirely with us yet.”

  Perrin shook his head again, trying to dislodge tempting thoughts of how they could test just how much or little pain the captain could feel right now. The notion of dropping him from varying heights was presenting itself in his mind when he noticed Brillen gesturing slowly.