The Infernal Battalion

by Django Wexler

  The spearwoman was looking down at the girl, and her fierce expression was gone, replaced with an overwhelming grief. She’s desperate.

  “Please help her,” she said in Murnskai even Winter could understand. “My sister.”

  There was a long moment of silence.

  “I’ll do what I can,” Abraham said. “But we need to be alone.”

  The woman nodded and crawled out of the tent without another word. Winter hesitated for a moment.

  “You’re sure about this?” she said. “She knows that’s not a wound anyone can live through. Which means she’s going to know—”

  “It doesn’t matter now,” Abraham said, looking down at the dying girl. “She’s here. I’m here. I can’t just ignore her.”

  Winter nodded slowly.

  “We’ll deal with the consequences when they happen,” Abraham said. He let out a long breath. “Wait outside, please. It’s easier with no one watching.”

  Winter pushed her way out of the tent on her hands and knees, clambering awkwardly to her feet beside the spearwoman leader. Someone had draped a fur blanket over Alex’s shoulders, and she looked comfortable enough. The rest of the spearwomen were still going about the business of setting up the camp, but throwing frequent glances in their direction.

  “He’ll help your sister,” Winter said, in her halting Murnskai. “He is... a very good healer.”

  The spearwoman nodded vaguely. She was staring into the forest, in the direction the red-​eyes had come from. Winter followed her gaze, searching for movement, but there was nothing but the dead trees.

  “What’s your name?” Winter said. “I’m Winter.”

  “Winter.” The woman frowned, and touched her chest. “Letingerae.”

  “Letin... gah... ray?” Winter struggled with the unfamiliar syllables. The woman grinned, for the first time since Winter had met her.

  “Leti,” she said. “I’m Leti.”

  “My friends are Alex and Abraham,” Winter said, pointing. “What’s your sister’s name?”

  Leti looked away. “Vess.”

  “Winter?” Abraham’s voice came from within the tent. “You can come inside now.”

  Leti pushed through the tent flap so quickly the whole structure shook, Winter worming her way in after. Abraham was undoing the bandage from Vess’ middle, using it to scrape at some of the dried blood and pus. Even through the grime, it was clear that there was unbroken skin underneath, and the girl’s breathing was visibly eased. Leti’s eyes widened.

  “She will sleep for a long time,” Abraham said. “A day or two, maybe. And we will need water, to clean her. But she will be fine.”

  “You...” Leti paused, swallowing hard. “You are—” And then a word Winter didn’t recognize.

  “What’d she say?” Winter said.

  “It means... Blessed One, maybe?” Abraham frowned. “I’m not sure I understand the theology.”

  “It doesn’t sound like the sort of thing you kill someone for being,” Winter said.

  Abraham nodded and said in Murnskai, “I think so. I may not understand you properly.”

  “She will live.” Leti looked down at her sister. “She will really live?”

  Abraham nodded. “She will live.”

  “I will clean her.” The spearwoman didn’t look up. “We will find you a tent. You are welcome to share our fire.”

  Winter closed her eyes and breathed a prayer of thanks to anyone who might be listening.

  7

  Raesinia

  Raesinia had never been out on the ocean before. The river Vor was deep and wide enough that oceangoing vessels could come as far north as Vordan City, and she’d been aboard a few of those—​most notably the Rosnik, where she’d been captured by Ionkovo during Maurisk’s coup. Once, as a girl, she’d gone with her father to Vayenne, at the mouth of the river, and seen the harbor there.

  That trip had taken several weeks, with frequent stopovers for official functions along the way. The Prudence made the same voyage in a little less than two days, even accounting for several halts at military checkpoints. Raesinia was no judge of ships, but the courier looked fast, sleek and streamlined as a dolphin with two masts whose spars seemed absurdly overlarge. She’d taken them downriver with only a few sails deployed, giving Raesinia the impression of a spirited horse eager to get out of the stalls and into a field where it could work up a gallop.

  Certainly, she moved well compared to the fat-​bellied merchantmen they passed along the way. Prudence had no room to spare. Aside from her small crew, she carried only passengers and a sack of diplomatic correspondence from the Borelgai embassy. Even the Queen of Vordan was asked to share a cabin, though the captain had offered up his own accommodation for her use. Raesinia didn’t mind sharing with Cora, though, especially since the girl was in on her secret and Raesinia didn’t have to pretend she could sleep.

  Cora didn’t sleep much, either, as far as Raesinia could tell. She’d hardly been able to sit still since she’d first heard about the voyage. Their destination, Viadre, was the capital of Borel, and as far as trade and finance were concerned practically capital of the world. To someone like Cora, for whom the stock books of the Exchange were light reading, visiting the great markets of Viadre was the next best thing to visiting the kingdom of God.

  Besides Cora, Raesinia had brought the minimum entourage she thought she could get away with: Barely and Jo as her personal guards, a pair of maids chosen by Mistress Lagovil, and Eric. Duke Dorsay was on board, and the Borelgai ambassador, Ihannes Pulwer-​Monsangton; and with their staff and guards along as well it was no wonder the Prudence felt decidedly cramped. Raesinia spent as much time as she could on deck, staying out of the way of the crew and marveling at the speed with which the coastline slid by.

  Once they’d cleared Vayenne’s breakwater, the courier had started her run in earnest, hoisting so much canvas that Raesinia expected them to be lifted out of the water entirely. Winds were apparently favorable, and they ran northwest, within easy view of the rumpled Vordanai coast. Ihannes had told her they’d keep on like that all around the bulge of western Vordan, past Enzport and Ecco Island, until they passed the jutting peninsula of the Jaw and struck out northeast across the Borel Sea.

  Raesinia couldn’t have said exactly where they were, at the present. The coast all looked the same, little port towns and river mouths, cliffs and rolling hills. She leaned against the rail near the bow of the ship, watching the waves and the clouds. Off to her left, the ocean went on and on into the infinite distance, until blue-​gray sky and gray-​blue water met at the horizon. Somewhere in that general direction was Khandar, and the mysterious southern kingdoms on the other side of the Great Desol. Maybe I’ll get to visit, after my official death.

  Raesinia shook her head. Something about the sight sent her thoughts in melancholy directions. She looked over her shoulder at Barely and Jo, her ever-​present shadows. Barely looked cross, as usual, but Joanna was staring out over the water with a dreamy expression.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Raesinia said.

  Barely gave a little start, then shrugged. “It’s all right, I guess.” She looked up at Jo. “No ocean in Desland. We’d never seen it before we got to Vayenne.”

  Jo’s hands moved, her eyes staying fixed on the horizon.

  “She says she never thought it would be so big,” Barely translated. “Like there’s nothing but water in the whole world.”

  “Not far from the truth, I suppose,” Raesinia said. She pushed herself back from the rail, then shook her head when the two of them made to follow. “Stay here. Get some rest.”

  “We ought to stay by your side,” Barely said. “I don’t trust the Borels.” Jo nodded emphatic agreement.

  “I trust Duke Dorsay, for whatever that’s worth,” Raesinia said. “I don’t think we’re in danger until we land in Viadre.”

  After that, though, is another story...

  *

  “I under
stand your reasoning, of course,” Dorsay said, steadying himself with a hand on the wall. “I just wish you’d been a bit more... circumspect.”

  They were in Raesinia’s—​formerly the captain’s—​cabin, the largest space on the ship with any semblance of privacy. The wind had picked up, so the air was a mass of creaking, groaning wood and straining ropes, mixed with the shouted commands of the sailors struggling to keep the sails in the right places. It was all gibberish to Raesinia, but the racket provided enough cover that she felt like they could be reasonably sure they weren’t overheard.

  Unfortunately, the constant sway of the ship left them both rolling back and forth like wobbling jellies. Dorsay seemed unaffected, but there was a distinct queasiness at the pit of Raesinia’s stomach. The binding heals me from everything else. Can’t it do something about seasickness? She did her best to put it out of her mind.

  “You know we didn’t have time to be diplomatic,” Raesinia said. “The army is on its way to confront Janus as we speak. Aid that arrives weeks after the decisive battle is no better than no aid at all.”

  “Yes, yes,” Dorsay said. “I have fought a campaign or two of my own, young lady.”

  “What I don’t understand is why Georg”—​she’d adopted his habit of familiar reference to the King of Borel—“isn’t being more helpful. He sent you and your army to Murnsk to stop Janus, with the authority to make a deal with me if that’s what it took. Why hesitate now?”

  “If it were entirely up to Georg, I believe he would send help at once. But the situation is more complicated.”

  “You’ve said that before.” Raesinia sat on the bed, which was bolted to the floor, in the hopes that it might help with her stomach. It didn’t. “Maybe you’d better explain. Borel doesn’t have anything like the Deputies-​General.”

  “Not officially, no.” Dorsay sighed and stroked his famous nose. “There’s a group of nobles who serve as advisers to the king. They call themselves the ‘Honest Fellows,’ possibly in jest. Some of them are from old families, others are merely vastly rich, but together they represent the most powerful forces in the realm. The ordinary business of the government is handled by one of them, or their subordinates, with the permission of the king.”

  Raesinia frowned. The way they talked about him in Vordan, she’d always imagined the King of Borel as a tyrant, with no checks on his authority. I should have known that politics is politics, wherever you go. “And these Honest Fellows don’t want to help?”

  “Some of them might. Some might complain about the cost. Others might prefer that Vordan weaken itself with a long civil war.” Dorsay scowled. “I am convinced that there is a faction that wants us to continue the war with Vordan, presumably because they have interests in the armaments industry. A few might prefer to deal with Janus than risk your notions about ‘votes’ and ‘Deputies’ spreading across the Borel Sea. The point is that a majority among the advisers would like Borel to stay well clear for the present, especially now that Janus is no longer threatening to march on Elysium.”

  “Was that true when you brought your army to Murnsk?”

  “More or less. Georg can, of course, overrule the Honest Fellows when he wishes. In that case, he knew that if he did nothing and Elysium was destroyed, the peasantry would be incensed.” Dorsay coughed. “I may have had something to do with it as well. I spoke in favor of intervention at some length.”

  “But now you don’t think he’ll be willing to act again.”

  “As I said, the case is no longer as clear. It... may be possible to persuade him.” Dorsay’s gaze went distant for a moment. “But he will demand concessions, and you may not be able to agree.”

  Raesinia nodded slowly. “And I take it our friend Ihannes works for the nonintervention faction?”

  “Decidedly so. His patron is Fredrick Goodman, one of the Honest Fellows and possibly the wealthiest single individual in Borel. If not the world. He leads the voices who argue against any action that might impinge on state coffers.”

  “Lovely,” Raesinia muttered. “Well, I’m sure he and Cora will have a great deal to discuss.”

  *

  Cora was standing at Raesinia’s shoulder, bouncing on the balls of her feet, as the Prudence arrived at the mouth of the river Brack. It was a cold, blustery day, with a spitting rain falling from low-​hanging clouds to moisten the deck and everyone on it. Despite the weather, there was no question of remaining below. The port of Harborside was one of the wonders of the world.

  Viadre proper straddled the Brack somewhere upstream, protected from the swells driven by cold northern winds blowing across the Borel Sea. In ages past, Harborside had been a separate town, where ships too big to ascend the shallow river could shift their cargo to flat-​bottomed barges. Over the years, Viadre had sprawled into the countryside, tendrils of streets and buildings reaching out to engulf the nearby communities, until places like Harborside were part of the city in all but name. The old docks, with their wood piers and crumbling stone breakwater, had been cleared away more than a hundred years ago.

  Their replacement was built on a massive scale. The Brack let out into a wide bay, with three channels to the sea separated by a pair of small islands. The old breakwater had protected only a portion of this space, and ships had been forced to ride at anchor around the islands, with frequent wrecks when the winds grew too high. The new breakwater closed off the bay completely, two of the channels blocked by massive wood-​and-​tar palisades anchored to stone pilings. More walls flanked the main channel, including a mobile barrier that could be swung closed at need in high seas.

  With the bay protected from ocean swells, docks had sprung up like fungus, spreading out from the river mouth in both directions. Stone quays served His Majesty’s Navy and other official ships, while wooden piers of every possible description belonged to trading companies and other concerns.

  All of this Cora explained to Raesinia as the captain slowed the Prudence and carefully navigated the harbor entrance. She was unable to help herself, so Raesinia bore it stoically. To her, the breakwater looked like the outer wall of an old-​fashioned hill fort, rising out of the water instead of clinging to a mountaintop. But there were no defenses here—​no hoardings, no embrasures for guns. It was a deliberate statement, she decided. His Majesty’s Navy was protection enough for Borel, and always would be.

  The harbor inside the breakwater made its own kind of statement. Raesinia had often seen the docks in Vordan City and marveled at the complexity of commerce, the sheer number of people hurrying about in what looked like absolute chaos but was actually a strange kind of order. It had always reminded her of an anthill, that same busy sense of motion. But if the Vordan City docks were an anthill, then Harborside was the city rising around that anthill, utterly dwarfing it.

  The ranks of docked vessels went on forever, stretching out as far as she could see through the curtains of falling rain. They came in every possible variety and combination of colors, shapes, and sizes, an endless forest of masts with sails tied tight around their spars. Raesinia recognized a few men-of-war, flying the muddy red Borelgai flag, but the ensign of every nation she’d ever heard of was represented, along with quite a few she hadn’t. Small boats scurried around them, propelled by sweating, swearing oarsmen wrapped in brightly colored oilcloth.

  “That’s a Hannamen junk,” Cora said, bouncing higher and higher as they came closer. “They’re from the southern kingdoms! And that one’s a League warship. It has to be at least a hundred years old. And—”

  “Your young companion knows her ships,” Duke Dorsay said, coming to stand with them at the rail.

  “She’s here in her capacity as an official of the treasury,” Raesinia said. “But I find she knows just about everything.”

  “Not everything. I—” Cora flushed and stopped bouncing, then looked awkwardly at Dorsay. “Thank you, Your Highness. I’m sorry if I was overexcited.”

  “Don’t worry on my account,” Raesinia s
aid, flashing her a smile. “Just remember what we came here for.”

  Cora nodded, her eyes going beyond the line of ships. “Viadre.” She looked at Dorsay again. “Will the Great Market be open in the rain?”

  Dorsay snorted. “If it closed whenever it rained, we’d only have a market four days a year. You know the saying about Borelgai seasons? We have three.”

  “Cold rain, colder rain, and snow,” Raesinia finished. “No wonder your people have such an affinity for the sea. You practically have to swim even on land.”

  “Exactly. I’m the odd one because I prefer a good horse to a deck under my feet.” Dorsay laughed uproariously.

  Raesinia wondered if they’d have to fight for a berth, but the courier ships had their own pier, patrolled by red-​uniformed guards. The Prudence docked with no delays, and the captain made a ceremony of handing over the official courier bag to a waiting mail coach, which took off at a gallop. Another pair of carriages, considerably more ornate, had been provided for the queen and her escort. Raesinia, her guards, and Eric took one, while Cora and the servants accompanied the baggage. The driver set a sedate pace, and Raesinia looked out through rain-​glazed windows as they wound through Harborside. Viadre had a very different look from Vordan City, quite apart from the constant rain—​the houses were almost all brick, instead of timber and plaster, and they had many stories and steeply canted roofs.

  “I’ve met with the ambassador,” Eric said, opening a folded sheaf of paper. “While a formal reception will take some time to arrange, he assures me that His Majesty will want to welcome you immediately. We’ll go directly to the palace.”

  “Cora will want to go into the city and see the market,” Raesinia said, most of her attention still on the window. It seemed like such a gloomy place. How do they live without ever seeing the sun? “I assume we won’t talk about anything important today?”