He was Krix, Lord Commander of the Horde. It galled Kenteg that he had to bend his knee to this human, and yet at the same time, he feared what would happen if he didn’t. Krix was favored by the gods of the alignment and their chosen commander. The council had placed their faith in him and Krix had delivered. Under his command, the Horde had conquered nearly two thirds of this world and soon would take the rest.
Krix was tall for a human. He wore no armor, nor did he carry a weapon. All he had on was a plain black tunic with a thick gray belt, a black traveling cloak, and muddy boots. His face was as hard as ice and his gaze had been known to make others tremble in fear. Kenteg had always sensed a clear menace about the human that spoke of great danger best not stirred.
Kenteg had never witnessed Krix use the powers the gods had gifted him. He hoped it remained that way. The Lord Commander was a monster in disguise and one of the few humans to be truly and utterly feared.
Krix jumped the last few feet to the ground. He stretched out his back before spotting Kenteg. He started over, slowly pulling off his black leather gloves, one finger at a time. He tucked them into his belt. Behind him, the dragon gave a screeching roar before settling down upon the ground and curling up as if to go to sleep.
“General Kenteg,” Krix said, speaking fluent orcish. He rubbed both hands together for warmth. “It is good to see you.”
No warmth reached the Lord Commander’s tone.
“You as well, my lord,” Kenteg said as he knelt and bent his head. Though in truth, he wished Krix would stay away and leave him to do his job. These visits of the Lord Commander had, of late, become more frequent. He was very much aware they could one day prove unhealthy for him, should he catch the Lord Commander in the wrong mood. Weakness, or even the perception of it, was something Krix did not tolerate.
“Rise,” Krix said in a weary tone. “It has been a long flight and I have more traveling that needs to be done before the day is out. I would dispense with our business as rapidly as possible.”
Kenteg stood. “How can I help you, my lord?”
“I have come,” Krix said, “for a personal report on your progress.”
“I see, my lord,” Kenteg said, having expected nothing different.
Krix’s gaze traveled over his shoulder. Kenteg turned to look. His guards were removing the body of the messenger, dragging him upon the ground by the legs and away from his tent.
“Having problems?” Krix asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I needed to administer some discipline,” Kenteg said. “I decided a personal touch was required.”
“And that, my general, is why I have placed my faith in you. You are not afraid to get your hands dirty.”
“As always, my lord, I am honored by your trust,” Kenteg said, then decided to return to the matter at hand. He wanted Krix on his way as rapidly as possible. “We are close to locating Grata’Dagoth. I assure you, my lord, it is only a matter of time until the fortress, or what is left of it, is found . . . days at best.”
Krix did not reply. His gaze returned to the messenger being dragged away. The Lord Commander’s eyes narrowed.
Did he know? How could he?
“In the searching of the ruins of this land, we uncovered a prophecy,” Kenteg said, more to distract Krix than anything else. “I was about to send a dispatch on its find.”
“A prophecy?” Krix turned back to face him with an intense look. “What prophecy?”
“A dwarven prophecy,” Kenteg said, abruptly on guard, for Krix’s dark-eyed gaze was focused squarely upon him, as if Kenteg were suddenly the most important person in the world. “It was etched into the stone walls of a tomb. My scribes copied it down. The wording is cryptic, written in ancient dwarven, but we have much of it already transcribed. The wizard is helping, which has sped things along.”
“And?” Krix asked impatiently.
“The prophecy speaks of a gathering of dwarven nations,” Kenteg said, nervously, “and the rise of new or, really, old powers upon this world. It gets a little confusing at that point, my lord.”
“Does it now?” Krix stroked his shaven chin for several heartbeats. “If it is genuine prophecy, you have once again reinforced my faith in you, General.”
“I believe it to be genuine,” Kenteg said. “So too does the wizard.”
“Well then,” Krix said, “I would very much like to see this prophecy.”
“It is in my headquarters tent,” Kenteg said and gestured towards the next tent over. The sides had been rolled up and numerous clerks could be seen working underneath lamplight. A wizard of the black was in there too, somewhere. Kenteg disliked the wizard, who cared not for authority or the chain of command. The wizard went where he wanted and did what he desired, no matter the consequences. He had caused more than a little difficulty for Kenteg.
“Let’s go see this prophecy you’ve found,” Krix said, “for I have seen one similar to what you have described.”
“Yes, my lord,” Kenteg said, but he was only speaking to the Lord Commander’s back, for Krix had already started for the tent at a brisk pace. Kenteg hurried to catch up.
The End
Enjoy this short preview of Marc’s First book:
Stiger’s Tigers
Chronicles of an Imperial Legionary Officer
ONE
Two road-weary riders, both legionary officers, crested the bald hill and pulled to a halt. A vast military encampment surrounded by entrenchments and fortifications took up much of the valley below them in a shocking display. Smoke from thousands of campfires drifted upward and hung over the valley like a veil. After months of travel, the two riders were now finally able to set their eyes upon their destination—the main encampment of General Kromen’s Imperial Army, comprising the Fifteenth, Eighteenth, Twenty-Ninth, and Thirtieth Legions. These four legions had been dispatched by the emperor to put down the rebellion burning through what the empire considered her southern provinces.
The awful stench of the encampment had been on the wind for hours. This close, the smell of decay mixed with human waste and a thousand other smells was nearly overpowering. What should have been relief at finally reaching their destination had turned to incredulous horror. Neither of them had ever seen anything like it. Imperial encampments were typically highly organized, with priority placed on sanitation to reduce the chance of sickness and disease. The jumble of tents and ramshackle buildings laid out before them, surrounded by the fortifications, spoke of something much different. It told of an almost wanton criminal neglect for the men who served the empire, or perhaps even incompetence in command.
An empty wagon, the first of a sad-looking supply train, rumbled around past the two riders, who refused to give way. The driver, a hired teamster, cursed at them for hogging the road. He took his frustration out on a group of dirty and ragged slaves sitting along the edge of the road. The slaves, part of a work gang to maintain the imperial highway, were forced to scramble out of the way, lest the wagon roll over them as it rumbled around the two travelers.
An overseer resting on a large fieldstone several feet away barked out a harsh laugh before shouting at the slaves to be more careful. One of the slaves collapsed, and yet both riders hardly spared him a glance. Slaves were simply beneath notice.
The supply train’s nominal escort, a small troop of cavalry riding in a line alongside the wagons, was working its way slowly up the hill toward the two officers and away from the encampment. Much like every other legionary the two travelers had come upon for the last hundred miles, the cavalry troop was less than impressive, though somewhat better looking in appearance. Their armor wasn’t as rusted and had been recently maintained.
Several empty wagons rumbled by the two, which saw additional invectives hurled their way. They ignored the cursing, just as they had disregarded the wagons and the plight of the slaves. Where they had come from, it would have been unthinkable for someone to hurl invectives at an officer, who was almost assuredly a nobleman. A
t the very least, a commoner would invite a severe beating with such behavior. Here in the South, such lack of basic respect seemed commonplace.
One of the travelers had the hood of his red imperial cloak pulled up as far as it would go and tilted his head forward to protect against a light drizzling rain, which had been falling for some time.
The other had the hood of his cloak pulled back, revealing close-cropped brown hair and a fair but weather-hardened face, marred only by a slight scar running down the left cheek. The scar pulled the man’s mouth up into a slight sneer. He looked no older than twenty-five, but his eyes, which seemed to miss nothing, made him look wise beyond his years. The slaves, having settled down in a new spot, watched the two warily.
As the first of the cavalry troop crested the hill, which was much steeper on the encampment’s side, the lieutenant in command pulled his mount up.
“Well met, Captain,” the lieutenant said. The lieutenant’s lead sergeant also stopped his horse.
The cavalry troop continued to ride by, the men wearing their helmets to avoid the drizzling rain but miserably wet just the same. The lieutenant offered a salute, to which the captain simply nodded in reply, saying nothing. The captain’s gaze—along with that of his companion, whose face was concealed by the hood of his cloak—remained focused on the encampment below.
After several uncomfortable moments, the lieutenant once again attempted to strike up a conversation. “I assume you came by way of Aeda? A miserable city, if you ask me. Can you tell me the condition of the road? Did you encounter any rebels?”
The lieutenant shivered slightly as the captain turned a cold gray-eyed gaze upon him.
“We saw no evidence of rebels,” the captain replied in a low, gravelly voice filled with steel and confidence. “The road passed peacefully.”
“That is good to hear,” the cavalry officer replied. “I am Lieutenant Lan of the One Hundred Eighty-Seventh Imperial Horse Regiment. May . . . may I have your name, Captain?”
“Stiger,” the captain growled, kicking his horse into motion and rapidly moving off the crest of the hill, down toward the encampment.
The lieutenant’s eyes widened. Stiger’s companion, without a word or a sideways glance, followed at a touch to his horse, leaving the lieutenant behind.
The door to the guardhouse opened and after a moment banged closed like it had undoubtedly done countless times before. Stiger and his companion stepped forward, their heavy bootfalls thunking across the coarse wooden floorboards that were covered in a layer of dirt made slick from the rain. The floor had not been swept in a good long time.
“Name and purpose?” a bored ensign demanded, his back to the door. A counter separated the ensign from any newcomers. He was sitting at a table, attempting to look busy and important by writing in a logbook. After a few moments, when the ensign heard nothing in reply, he stood and turned with obvious irritation, prepared to give the new arrivals a piece of his mind. He was confronted with two wet officers, one a captain and the other a lieutenant.
Stiger locked the ensign with a piercing gaze. The ensign was old for his rank, which was generally a sign that he was unfit for further promotion. Instead of forcing such a useless man out of service, he was put in a position where he could do little harm and perhaps accomplish something useful. It had been Stiger’s experience that such men became bitter and would not hesitate to abuse what little power was available to them.
Flustered, the ensign tried again. “Name and purp—”
“Captain Stiger and companion,” Stiger interrupted, with something akin to an irritated growl. The captain slowly placed his hands on the dirty counter and leaned forward toward the man. The ensign—most likely accustomed to dealing with lowly teamsters, drovers, corporals, and sergeants—blinked. His jaw dropped. He stood there for a moment, dumbfounded, before remembering to salute a superior officer, fist to chest. Stiger said nothing in reply, but gestured impatiently for the ensign to move things along.
“Forgive me, sir,” the ensign stammered. It was then, as the lieutenant who accompanied the captain pushed back the hood of his cloak, that he noticed Captain Stiger’s companion was not human. The ensign’s mouth dropped open even further, if that was possible.
“Lieutenant Eli’Far,” the elf introduced himself in a pleasantly soft, singsong kind of voice that sounded human, but was tinged with something alien at the same time. Eli was tall, whipcord thin, and very fair. His perpetually youthful face, complete with blue almond-shaped eyes and sharply pointed ears, was perfect. Framed by sand-colored hair, perhaps it was even too perfect.
“I have orders to report to General Kromen,” Stiger stated simply, impatient to be done with the fool before him.
“Of course, sir,” the ensign stammered, remembering himself. He slid a book across the counter. “If you will sign in, I will have you escorted directly to General Kromen’s headquarters.”
Stiger grabbed a quill, dipped it in the inkbottle sitting on the counter, and signed for both himself and Eli. He put down the quill and pushed the book back toward the ensign.
“Corporal!” the ensign called in a near-panicked shout.
The guard corporal poked his head into the guardhouse.
“Captain Stiger requires an escort to the commanding general’s headquarters.”
The corporal blinked as if he had not heard correctly. “Yes, sir,” he said, fully stepping into the guardhouse, eyes wide. “This way, gentlemen,” the corporal said in a respectful tone. It was never wise to upset an officer, and even more irresponsible to offend one from an important family, no matter how infamous. “I will escort you myself. It is a bit of a ride, sirs.”
The two traveling companions followed the corporal out of the guardhouse. They stepped back into the rain, which had changed from a drizzle to a steady downpour. Eli pulled his hood back up, once again obscuring his features. Stiger left his down. They retrieved their horses from where they had secured them and mounted up. The corporal also mounted a horse that was waiting for such a purpose and led them through the massive wooden gate that served as the encampment’s main entrance. Stiger was disgusted to see the sentries huddled for cover under the gate’s overhang. Those men should have been on post despite the weather.
Stiger had thought it impossible for the stench of the encampment to get any worse, yet it became much more awful and unpleasant once they were clear of the gate. It made his eyes burn. He had only ever once encountered a worse smell. That had been years before on a distant battlefield, with the dead numbering in the many thousands under a brutally hot sun, rotting quicker than they could be buried or burned.
Massive numbers of tents and temporary ramshackle wooden buildings spread out before them, amongst a sea of mud flowing with animal and human excrement. The three worked their way slowly through the muddy streets with rows of tents on each side. They came upon a small stream, muddy brown and swollen from the day’s rain, running through the center of the encampment. The stream was threatening to flood nearby tents.
A rickety wooden bridge, which looked as though it had been hastily constructed to ford the small stream, appeared at risk of being washed away by the growing rush of water. Unconcerned, the corporal guided them over the bridge and to a large rough-looking building directly in the center of the encampment. An overhang and porch had been constructed onto the building, almost as an afterthought, but probably in response to the rain and mud.
Several staff officers on the porch loitered about in chairs, idly chatting and smoking pipes or playing cards, as the three horsemen approached. It was clear this was the main headquarters. A rough planked boardwalk that looked like it might sink into the mud at any moment connected the building to a row of larger tents and other nearby buildings. The porch and boardwalk served the purpose of saving the officers from having to get their perfectly polished boots muddy.
A dirty and ragged slave, ankles disappearing in the muck, stepped forward to take the reins of their horses as the tw
o officers dismounted. Stiger tried to avoid thinking about what was in the mud as his boots sank into it.
“Good day, sirs.” The corporal saluted and swung his horse around, riding away before anything more could be required of him. Stiger understood that the man was relieved to be on his way. It was said that bad things tended to happen around Stigers.
“This camp is an embarrassment,” Eli said quietly to Stiger. “It is very unfit.”
“I hazard half the camp is down sick,” Stiger responded in sour agreement. He had never seen a legionary encampment in such a state. “Let us hope we are not detained here for months on end.”
The two walked through the mud and up the steps to the front porch of the headquarters building, where they hastily kicked and scraped the muck from their boots. The headquarters building was not at all what one would expect for the commanding general of the South. The finely attired officers on the porch purposefully ignored the new arrivals. Stiger hesitated a moment and then stepped toward the building’s entrance, reaching for the door.
“Where exactly do you think you’re going?” a young staff captain sitting in a chair demanded disdainfully without looking up from his card game. The man was casually smoking and took a rather slow pull from his pipe, as if to show he was in charge.
Stiger turned to look at the staff captain, who wore expensively crafted legionary officer armor over a well-cut tunic and rich black boots. The armor was highly polished and the fine red cloak appeared to be freshly cleaned and brushed. There was not a hint of mud or dirt anywhere on the officer. He almost looked like the perfect toy soldier. Stiger took him to be of the soft type, a spoiled and pampered nobleman, likely from a minor yet wealthy house. At least wealthy or influential enough to secure his current position. Much like the ensign in the guardhouse, Stiger had also unfortunately encountered this kind of officer before—a bootlicking fool. Stiger’s lip curled ever so slightly in derision. The bootlicker, more concerned with his fawning entourage of fellow officers, did not seem to notice. Eli, however, did. He placed a cautioning hand on Stiger’s arm, which had come to rest upon the pommel of his sword.
Reclaiming Honor Page 37