Neither Aubin nor Chabris said anything and the awkward silence returned.
“So,” Boudain said, after he had allowed the discomfort to draw out. “You didn’t come here to rally to my banner. Why, then?”
Aubin opened his mouth to speak, but the king cut him off.
“You must have heard I was here, and most likely also that I was very ill. You put your differences aside and rode here to make sure Savin couldn’t use me as a figurehead to build a more powerful army. Or to make sure I didn’t get the chance to heal. Perhaps both?”
Chabris flushed from shame, but Aubin’s face twisted spitefully. “You’re bewitched,” he said. “Possessed by a sorceress. You have no legitimate claim to the throne. Not any longer.”
“That’s quite an interesting appreciation you have of the law, there, Cousin Aubin,” the king said. “Completely wrong, of course, but it goes to show your spying seems to have improved since that day you got caught peeping at the ladies swimming in the lake at the summer palace.”
“You can try all you like to embarrass me, Boudain, but it won’t change a damned thing.”
Gill raised an eyebrow at the use of the king’s given name, and moved his hand a little closer to his sword. Any semblance of respectful discourse was now far behind them.
“There was no magic cast on me but to undo that which had been done by my enemies. Transfer your troops to my authority and return to your estates, and I promise to forget this conversation happened,” the king said calmly.
“You’ve had magic done to you,” Aubin said. “You’re not my king, or anyone else’s, Boudain. Not anymore.” He looked to the Count of Savin, who sat on his horse next to the king. “My Lord Savin, I make now the offer we came to deliver. Join your forces to ours and ride with us against this tyrannical warlock.”
“Who’d be king?” Gill said.
Everyone looked at him and he felt suddenly self-conscious.
“If you win,” Gill repeated, “who’d be king?”
“Well,” Aubin said. “I’m of the senior branch.”
“But through the female line,” Boudain said. “Savin is the senior by age, and dear Chabris is senior through the male line. How many civil wars do you plan on fighting to untangle that mess?”
“We all have the best interests of the realm at heart,” Aubin said.
Boudain barked out a laugh. “Then assign your troops to my command and return home. You have until sunset to make your decision. After that, your names go on my list next to the Prince Bishop’s.” He turned his horse and started back toward the village.
Gill moved immediately to follow his king, but Count Savin hesitated and the honour guard remained with him. Faced with a larger army, the rewards of supporting the king through this trial instantly became less likely, but switching sides didn’t necessarily offer any better position. Gill knew as well as anyone how nobles—particularly those with a claim to the throne—operated. He could see the gears turning over in Savin’s head. He knew as well as Gill did that even in the best-case scenario, only one of the cousins would live to see the end of this civil war. He was just trying to work out the likelihood of that being him.
With a nod as he passed, Gill said, “You ride over there to join them and I’ll make sure you’re dead before sundown.” He smiled at Savin’s outraged expression. “Hope that helps make your decision easier.”
He urged his horse forward, catching up to the king, who had never looked back. A moment later, Gill heard the jingling of harness and glanced over his shoulder. Savin and the honour guard were following them back to Castandres.
CHAPTER
22
“They have twice our number, at least,” the king said, when they got back to the illusory safety of the pickets. “If they choose to attack, what do we do?”
“Numbers aren’t everything,” Gill said, not sure what else he could do to allay the king’s concerns. “Troop quality counts for a lot, and attacking a defended position is always a big ask for peasant levies.”
“I doubt Savin’s troops are crack guardsmen,” the king said, looking around at the troops, who bore all the hallmarks of being levies themselves—improvised weapons, mismatched clothes.
Some men had the look of soldiers—probably mercenaries or members of the count’s personal retinue—but there weren’t enough of them to make a difference. They might hold back an initial assault, but without a solid force to back them up, Gill didn’t reckon they’d last a whole lot longer than the levies.
All in all, it didn’t look good. Gill knew they were going to have to get creative. Of course, Aubin and Chabris might conclude it better to side with the king once they’d had the chance to properly consider the idea.…
“Savin!” the king said. “Council of war in the tavern.”
Gill watched Savin carefully. He wasn’t convinced of the man’s loyalty. A quick escape might be his best option at this moment. While nobles didn’t tend to place much worth on their levies, the count would take his best troops with him. Guillot wondered if it would be worth arresting Savin now, before he had the chance to cause any trouble, but that wasn’t his call to make.
The king waited for the senior nobles to assemble in the tavern. He was starting to show some signs of agitation, but that was only to be expected. He had never fought in a battle before, much less commanded the opening clashes of a war. As with all heirs, he’d attended the Academy, but Gill doubted if he had done much more than pay lip service to his studies. This was as big a challenge as an experienced king and commander could expect to face. To have to deal with it at such an early stage of his reign would test him severely.
“Is everyone here?” Boudain finally said, when the taproom was full.
“Everyone of consequence,” Savin said.
“Can we expect any more troops to arrive in our support?”
“Possibly, Highness,” Savin said. “But in truth, I wouldn’t count on it. Not in time to make any difference.”
The king scratched his chin and stared into the distance. To Gill, it was clear that Boudain was doing everything he could so as not to appear out of his depth; he wondered if anyone else could see it. Other than the Count of Savin, who was older, most of the men in the room looked to be a decade younger than Gill. Few, if any, were old enough to have served in the last war. For them, this probably all seemed like a great adventure. Those that came out the other side wouldn’t think that way any longer.
“I, uh,” Boudain said, strain showing on his face. He looked across the gathering and his eyes stopped on Gill. The strain was replaced with an expression of relief. “Villerauvais! Villerauvais is one of our most experienced soldiers. He’s already made some interesting suggestions. How would you proceed in these circumstances?”
Every eye turned to Gill. He wanted to swear, but couldn’t with everyone looking at him.
“Aubin and Chabris are inexperienced commanders at the head of a levy army,” Gill said, doing his best to sound more confident than he was. He didn’t know much about either man, but reckoned he would have known more if they had distinguished themselves in any way. “We’re defending a position, rather than attacking. These three factors are strongly in our favour. As is the fact that Aubin and Chabris are likely arguing at this very moment over what to do next. Division within their ranks is an even bigger asset.”
He took a breath and looked around. Everyone seemed to be paying attention and no one had spoken up in criticism. Yet. He took that to be a good sign.
“With a fixed position to defend, our task is simpler, our tactics fewer. There’s only one, in fact, when you boil it down. Keep the enemy out. We repel their attacks until they break. With arguing commanders and inexperienced, untrained troops, that will be far sooner than it might otherwise.”
The room was completely silent. He wondered how many of the people gathered here knew who he was, and which version of his reputation they had heard. Would they have confidence in him? More importantly, did they have confi
dence in the king? The accusation levelled against him by the Count of Aubin was surely playing on everyone’s mind. Would the king’s entanglement with magic lose him the support of the few followers he did have?
“We’ll divide the picket into four sectors for defence and hold a reserve ready to reinforce any sector that’s coming under attack.” He kept talking, outlining basic tactics, as his mind ran through the danger that lurked closer to home. Although Gill had become more comfortable with the idea of magic and fantastic creatures being abroad once more, it was unlikely anyone else was. Solène needed to be ready to flee at a moment’s notice. If things turned against them, even the king wouldn’t be able to protect her.
“My Lord Savin, if you could have your five most senior commanders make themselves known to me, we can divide up our forces and allot assignments. In the meantime, have the men put to work reinforcing the pickets. We’ll need a platform around the inside to allow our men to stand above the attackers and strike down at them. Get them working on it now.”
Savin muttered something to Coudray, who left in a hurry, then pulled five men from the crowd, before ordering the rest to give them the room. Gill chewed his lip in consternation. His speech to the full room had been the easy part. Speaking in generalisations always was. Now he had to come up with specifics.
He walked over to the dead fire in the hearth and rooted around with the poker until he found a likely-looking piece of charred wood. Grabbing it, he walked to the largest section of exposed whitewashed wall. He hesitated for a moment before starting, but reckoned one day the tavern keeper might appreciate having the graffiti on his wall, and regale his customers with the day the king planned the defence of the village, and the first battle of what was sure to be a significant war, in that very room.
Working quickly, Guillot scratched some blocky shapes on the wall—the village—then drew a circle around that to indicate the pickets, although he had no idea what shape it actually was, or even if it completely enclosed the village. With a little luck, it would be by the time Aubin’s and Chabris’s men came knocking. That done, Gill drew one vertical and one horizontal line, breaking the diagram into four quadrants. Finally, he marked an “X” a short distance from his main drawing: the enemy.
He stepped back and regarded his work for a moment, refining his plan as he did, then wrote the numbers one to five down the side.
“We’ll divide our force in two,” Gill said. “One half will be split up between the four sections of the picket, while the other half will be held back in reserve to assist anywhere along the picket that’s getting hit hard. The key to this battle is holding the enemy off until they break or decide that the cost of getting through is too high. There are more battles to be fought in this war, and we’re not even facing the real enemy yet.”
“Hold on, and hope they go away?” Savin said. “That’s your plan?”
Gill knew this criticism was coming sooner or later, so it was no surprise. “What would your suggestion be, my Lord?”
“To fight like men,” the count said. “We lead our troops out onto the field and give battle properly. With honour. Not like caged rats.”
“Where their numerical advantage will allow them to envelop our flanks and slaughter us to a man?” Gill said. “The only way we limit their strength of numbers is here, behind our pickets. A man behind a wall is worth at least two trying to get through it. They won’t want to commit to a full siege. They could easily wake up one morning and find the Prince Bishop’s army at their back. With us at their front, they’d be wiped out before lunch.”
“When do you expect them to come at us?” Savin said, sounding suitably cowed.
Gill shrugged. “Who knows? They might even decide that we’re not worth the effort and march away. I think that’s unlikely, though. So long as the king lives, he’s a threat to anyone who wants the throne for themselves. I’m sorry to say it, Highness, but there are three men whose survival depends on your death. Likewise, yours depends on them dying.”
“Lord Savin is right,” the king said, finally breaking his silence. “We can’t kill them in here, hiding behind our walls.”
“Today isn’t about killing them,” Gill said. “Probably not tomorrow either. It’s about surviving long enough to hit back at them. For that we need to be steadfast and patient. If you rush in now, Highness, you’ll lose everything. We might rout your cousins on the open field if we go after them now—stranger things have happened—but we’ll break ourselves in the process, and when it comes to facing Amaury, he’ll smash us.”
The king didn’t like that idea, if the expression on his face was anything to go by. Gill didn’t reckon he was going to like much of what happened in the coming days, but if nothing else, it would give Boudain the chance to prove he was up to the job of being king. If he lacked the resolve, perhaps it would be better if one of his cousins got the job. Beating Amaury would take grit and a willingness to get his hands dirty. If he didn’t have that in him, this was the place to find out.
Gill allotted the assignments to Savin’s chosen officers and sent them off to get organised.
“Now we need to find a vantage point to keep an eye on everything,” Gill said. They wandered out into the village for a look around, but Gill was pretty sure there was only one place that fit the bill. There was a tall hayloft, and a clock tower on the village hall, but the church steeple was the highest point in sight. Gill wondered how the deacon would react to his coming calling again. And to him knocking some holes in the steeple.
The deacon seemed a little more relaxed about receiving visitors this time. So far, the army had behaved itself, and the presence of the king was another comforting factor. At least until word spread that a sorceress had cast magic on him. That wasn’t a problem Gill had seen coming. With a little luck, they’d have dealt with Amaury before it became too much of an issue.
The deacon cried out in protest when Gill smashed out a few slates on each side of the steeple’s roof, giving them a panoramic view of the countryside. The king’s small army was hard at work strengthening and raising the pickets, and building the platform around the inside. Beyond, the enemy army was setting up camp. That could mean they planned to attack right away and were hoping to lull the king into a false sense of security by appearing to be settling in for the night; or, it might indicate that they would wait at least until the next day before attacking. Uncertainty had always been the part that Gill found hardest. That, and the waiting. Most things about war were hard, now that he thought about it. However, he suspected Aubin and Chabris would argue over the king’s offer until the time limit expired, by which point it would be dark, and madness to attack with inexperienced troops.
“There’s a lot of them,” the king said, bringing his borrowed telescope to bear once again. “Can we really hold them off?”
“I’d like to say yes, Highness,” Gill said, “but it’d be a lie. There’s no reason why we can’t, but so many things can go wrong when you’ve an untested army. Believe it or not, it’ll be better if your cousins surround us. Our troops will fight a lot harder if they think there’s nowhere to run.”
The king laughed. “I’m not sure I like the sound of that.”
“There’s not much to like at a time like this, Highness.”
“What do we do?”
“What men in our situation always do,” Gill said. “They make the best of it.”
“How many wars have you fought in?”
Gill tried to count, but realised that with few exceptions, all battles blurred into one. What constituted a war, anyway? He’d fought in battles that had cost hundreds and thousands of men their lives, but most would probably not have been considered wars. “Enough that I have trouble counting, Highness.”
“I feel ashamed every time I think of you,” the king said.
Frowning, Gill stared at his king.
“A man who has served his kingdom so faithfully should never have been treated the way you were,” Boudain s
aid. “I’m sure you realise the Prince Bishop had a hand in it, but my father should have been stronger. Should have been able to recognise who his true friends were.”
“I…” Gill said. What was there to say to that? “Thank you, Highness.”
“I appreciate you standing with me on this. After all you’ve done, and been put through.” He returned his gaze to the enemy, and raised the telescope. “If we get out of this, I’ll do everything I can to undo the damage the Prince Bishop and my father caused you.”
CHAPTER
23
There were few spare moments when an army was preparing for battle, but when the commanders paused their discussions, Gill took the opportunity for a much-needed break. Putting into place the command structures for the village’s defence was tedious but necessary work. Everyone had to know who was responsible for what. They couldn’t risk the chance of something going unaddressed because everyone thought it was someone else’s job.
An idea had been forming in Gill’s mind for a while, and he allowed himself to follow it, which led him back to the seamstress’s house, to ask her to sew a banner for the king. He wasn’t sure why, but it seemed like the type of thing that might come in handy; if raised at the right moment, it might put mettle back into wavering troops. He knew only too well what a man would do for his king, and knowing that the king was with you in the thick of it might be the difference between fighting on or turning and running.
Task completed, he turned his mind to other necessities, like his swords. He’d left them sitting in the Wounded Lion in Mirabay. Like as not, they’d been stolen by now, along with everything else he’d left there. The swords, and Valdamar’s armour, which was with them, were all made from Telastrian steel. Worth a fortune. The innkeeper had appeared to be one of dal Ruisseau Noir’s confederates, so perhaps he had placed them in storage. It would be worth checking at the end of all this, assuming he survived.
Regardless, his predicament remained. He was without any of the accoutrements he needed to go into battle. He had returned the sword he had borrowed for the king’s confrontation with his cousins and he had no armour. There was a smith in the village, but there was no time to have anything new made. The best he’d be able to hope for was some hammering of heated plates to make any armour he scrounged up fit better.
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