A Perverted Path to Victory

Tinvel

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“Where’s Chona?” General Voth asked. Tinvel couldn’t have been in the room for more than five seconds.

“Medical issue.” The standard excuse. “Seeing a healer.”

“Better be bad for her to miss this.”

Is he stupid?

“It is.”

Tinvel took his seat without further comment. It wasn’t an auspicious table, but it was one hell of a gathering. He was seated to the right of Admiral B’Leary, joining the ancient man in suffering the withering glare of Minister Vesta. B’Leary didn’t look worse for wear, but Tinvel certainly felt the heat of the old blood’s penetrating gaze. Always serious, she now seemed downright disturbed. He shifted awkwardly in his chair, coughing and looking away.

The small, unadorned room was filled with the most important people in the city of Tulian. Sitting at a wooden table with wooden chairs, lit by a single crystal light in the ceiling above and a single window at the far end of the rectangular room. It definitely didn’t fit Tinvel’s mental image of what the Peasant’s Theater, seat of governance for the first Industrial Revolution, should be using for hosting such an apparently-critical gathering.

Professor Brown and Professor Garen were at the head of the table, shoulders pressed together as they huddled over a collection of hastily-assembled notes. The head of the Artificer’s Union, Smith’s Union, and, of all people, the Farmer’s Union were sitting near to them. With General Voth sitting opposite them, the only person missing was Artillery Lieutenant Shale, commander of the North Star Fort, and that would have been every important person currently in Tulian that wasn’t a member of Parliament. As for Lieutenant Shale’s absence, Tinvel only had rumors. Last he’d heard, she was still sitting in the fort’s brig, allowed to give orders or advice only when someone requested her input specifically, and even then communicating solely through slips of paper she handed off when the guards collected her chamber pot or delivered a meal through a small flap. If the rumors were to be believed, the last person to see her face had been the lawyer she’d been appointed for the military tribunal.

Lady Evie, it was no surprise, had been the presiding judge. While the exact details of her sentencing hadn’t been included, a pamphlet had been circulated through the military forces of Tulian, posted in every barrack and pinned to every ship’s mast. The headline had read, in capital and bolded letters, “Artillery Lieutenant Shale: An Example.”

No one in Tulian considered the Browns a subtle family.

The more Tinvel looked around him at those who were present, however, the more he realized that this wasn’t just any meeting. He’d hoped it was because of some diplomatic request, something like military equipment being sold to a foreign power that would need the more technologically-minded people of governance to weigh in on. Not so. And if their dour expressions were anything to go by, everyone else seemed more informed than him.

“Everyone’s here that’s going to get here in time, I think,” Professor Brown said. He cleared his throat, shuffling some papers. Despite the room being fairly cool, at least for any room in Tulian that didn’t have a breeze blowing through, sweat had completely soaked down his wide chest. “I’m not a, uh, military man, and what military history knowledge I have was mostly from a different period than most of you are used to dealing with, so, uh, bear with me here.” He wiped his brow. “At least I’ve got some public speaking experience. If you need to object or question me or say I’m wrong, just go ahead and do it. I’m used to it in the classroom, y’know. So.” He took a deep breath. “The Empire is planning to invade.”

Silence. Everyone had known that. The newspapers had been talking about it for months, responding to every parliamentary assurance that the Powdered Lead’s war was ‘far from home’ with acidic cynicism. You didn’t get to supply weapons to a nation and expect their enemy to shut up and deal with it.

“No surprise there, right? We knew it was coming. But the thing is, it’s gonna come a lot quicker than expected. That’s why you’re all here. We’re going to need to work on things a whole hell of a lot faster than we expected.”

“We’re at max capacity,” the Artificer’s Union representative said. “Unless you’re lifting the laws about working more than ten hours a day, we can’t do anything more.”

“We’re not lifting those, no,” Professor Brown replied. “Because I happen to be in agreement with my daughter that, no matter what you might think, you’re not going to get any real jump in productivity from working your people to the bone.”

“Why do we need to work faster, then?” The Farmer’s Union rep asked. She was a woman with thick shoulders, calloused fingers, and beady eyes. “How much faster? This meeting is a bunch of military types and me. There’s only one reason why I can imagine you needing me here, and I don’t like it.”

“Neither do we,” Minister Vesta replied. Her elevated accent seemed like royalty in the room full of commoners. “But if I have anticipated your suspicions correctly, you are right to be concerned. We need to begin stocking the central foodstores immediately.”

“And which hell did you drag that one up from, missy?” The Farmer’s Union rep drawled. “What do you mean by that? Even I know the Empire doesn’t have a Navy, and I know damn well they can’t march a few hundred miles fast enough to worry us that much.”

“They won’t be marching.” Professor Brown picked up a sheet of paper and slid it across the table. Tinvel nearly jumped out of his seat when it landed in front of him, shocked that he was even being acknowledged, but quickly swept it up and started scanning it. Professor Brown smiled apologetically. “Sorry I couldn’t get this to you before you arrived. Things are moving too fast.”

Professor Brown continued talking as Tinvel’s eyes began flicking across, to start with, the notes in the side margin.

Capacity est. twenty men seated, twice that if standing.

Range unknown.

Speed unknown.

Griffon towage?

Air defense?

Control mechanism?

Emergency training program?

“...depending on the size of the force they choose to deploy against us, the enemy’s gliders could reach the city in two or three days at the quickest,” Professor Brown was saying. “If they’re doing multiple trips to try and take everyone, and their production numbers remain low, it could take months. We really don’t know anything right now.”

Tinvel dropped his elbows on the table, pinching the paper between two fingers as if it might burn him.

Gliders. Dozens and dozens of them. Towed by more wyverns than the Governess could count. Gods help us.

“What do you think?” Someone asked.

Tinvel waited. After a moment passed without anyone answering, he looked up.

Everyone was looking at him. Even General Voth.

“Me? What do I think about what?”

“These gliders,” Professor Brown said. “You’re the expert here.”

“I’m not. You are. You’re the one that taught me everything about planes.”

“And you’re the one that actually built and flew them,” General Voth said. “You’re the expert now, kid. What do you think?”

The hells do you mean, ‘what do I think?’ What do I think about what? Everything?

“Well,” he began, drawing the word out for far too long. He licked his lips. “I think this is… pretty fucking bad.”

General Voth chuckled.

“Elaborate further, if you would please,” Vesta requested, elegant as ever. “The term ‘pretty fucking bad’ covers quite a wide berth, and I’d like to know specifics.”

“It’s…”

Tinvel looked around. Everyone was still staring at him. He could tell which ones had known the news before arriving by the color of their faces. The Artificer Union rep, the Professors, and Vesta had the same foul expression they’d started the meeting with. The Farming and Smithing reps, however, had turned an ashy gray, a new tiredness entering their countenance. Tinvel supposed he probably had the same look, too. He found himself glad the room was so cheaply made. There was nothing to see his reflection in.

He cleared his throat. “It’s very, very bad. Right now Tulian has about thirty combat-ready aeroplanes, but we’ve only got about twenty full crews of pilots and mages. That’s probably pretty close to all we’re ever going to have.” He glanced at Minister Vesta. “That’s all the combat-capable mages I’ve been told we can spare for aeroplane duty, anyway. If you’ve got more then I’d love to know about it, because we’ve been training more pilots than we have mages, and we could definitely produce more planes than we have been. But as far as air combat is concerned? Against wyverns?” He held his hands up helplessly. “What good would they do? Planes without mages can’t do anything. All they can do is get swatted out of the sky.”

He dropped his hands, looking around. The Union reps were far from encouraged. The farmer one looked downright angry, actually. Not at Tinvel, but at the scale of the job ahead of her. Tinvel didn’t envy her. The Republic of Tulian may have been a fraction of the size of the Old Kingdom, but the farms which fed it were still spread far and wide, following streams and creeks along the most fertile ground. It would take days to get the word out, then days more to communicate any changes or details of the plan that cropped up in the interim. He briefly considered offering aeroplane service for that, dropping messages or something, but nixed the idea before it left his mouth. They didn’t have the crews.

“Thank you, Commander Tinvel.” Garen shook out the sleeves of his robes, producing a quill and fresh sheet of paper. “Professor Brown and Commander Tinvel will now adjourn to their own tasks while we coordinate our efforts. Minister Vesta, has a suitable army representative been found?”

Bewildered, Tinvel didn’t move a muscle as he watched Professor Brown gather up his things. It was only when a bit of wood poked him in the leg that he looked away, finding Admiral B’Leary grinning at him.

“Best get to walkin’, kid. You got places to be.”

He belatedly stood, glancing over his shoulder to see Professor Brown waddling out the door, bundles of paper not-quite-spilling from his arms. He nodded his thanks to the Admiral before scrambling after the huffing Professor.

“Where are we going?” He asked as they hurried down the hallway.

“To make myself a worse person, I think,” Professor Brown puffed. “Can’t talk out here. Take some of these, alright? We’re going to a quiet room.”

“Just some random quiet room?” Tinvel asked as he grabbed a loose bundle of papers.

“Yeah. Wish we could get to Garen’s room, it’s got protection from scrying and all that, but we don’t have the time. Don’t worry. Already picked out a place.” Professor Brown was sweating even more profusely now. “We’ll talk about it in there. Got stuff ready for you. Chona really can’t come?”

Tinvel thought of the woman back home. Her heat was almost over, yet the symptoms had taken a turn for the… dramatic.

“Uh, no,” he said. Then, more firmly, “Definitely not. I’ll tell her about it.”

“Good. Hope you’ve got a good memory though, because it’s not going to be easy to remember, and you’re not allowed to take notes.”

Tinvel licked his lips. Looking up and down the Peasant Theatre’s halls, he started to get a better grasp of the Union representative’s moods. The narrow wooden hallways were crammed with scurrying people, yet it wasn’t loud. People were walking with their heads down, glancing up only to skirt around obstacles in their path, be it a wall or a person. The few conversations he heard were hushed, serious, and short. Many of them ended right when he got into earshot, then picked back up again as he left. The Peasant’s Theatre was not a happy place to be.

The room Professor Brown had picked out was easy enough to find; it was the only one in the whole building that was being guarded. What’s more, it was the only one that was being guarded by soldiers wearing actual, honestly enchanted armor. Though the magical light was dulled beneath green cloth coverings, they were veritable bonfires to Tinvel’s magical senses, revealing the haphazard and mismatched nature of their equipment in a way that he never would have been able to see at a glance. Each of them were wearing pieces from no less than six different armor sets, which meant they’d been looted from at least as many dead Knights during the last war. Tinvel had never seen so much enchanted gear in one place. Not since that day on the steps of the University when Garen had scattered the Knights that had come to ransack it. Even the guns held by the Tulian soldiers were strange, belonging to a design he didn’t recognize, one with a long bar of iron sticking out to the right and a dark box jutting from the bottom.

The scrapyard Knights didn’t salute as Professor Brown approached. They just peered at him through the slits in their helmets, then stepped aside. Even as the overburdened professor fumbled with the doorknob, his struggles completely unassisted by the silent soldiers, he politely thanked them for keeping the place safe.

When the door finally opened, Tinvel trod nervously past the two guards, wondering what they’d done in the last conflict to earn so much of Lady Evie’s trust.

Nothing gentle, that’s for sure.

Professor Brown dropped his stack of papers on a small table, shoving them to the far end without ceremony. The room, Tinvel quickly realized, wasn’t actually a room. It was a space between walls that hadn’t, apparently, been put to any use in all the time the Peasant’s Theatre had been in service. There was a thick layer of dust on everything, still smelling faintly of the old, original theatre: stale beer and sweaty people.

Professor Brown pulled out a chair, then used his leg to kick out one of the other two. He guessed the extra had been meant for Chona. Which meant this had been well-prepared ahead of time.

“What’s going on?” He asked as he sat.

Professor Brown hid his face in his hands for a moment, groaning loudly. He looked haggard when he emerged.

“Nothing good,” he said. He looked around them, hand grasping for something, and then he muttered something foul. “Can’t believe I didn’t get beer for this.”

Tinvel blinked. “You drink?”

He chuckled weakly, sitting back. “Yeah. Pretty regularly, believe it or not. Tastes good, feels nice. What’s not to like?”

“You never struck me as the type, I guess.”

“Yeah, well, that’s because a teacher should act like the type of person who doesn’t drink.” He sighed tiredly, leaning to one side. Tinvel thought he was stretching until he popped back upright, producing a thick, yellow-edged journal from some hidden space beneath the table. There was a crackle of spellcraft as the Professor opened the leatherbound volume, some strange energy reaching out to touch his skin before quietly dissipating.

Seeing Tinvel watching with wide eyes, he chuckled again. “Yeah. Garen’s work. Don’t open this book if you find it on your own.”

“What was that spell?” He leaned forward, curiosity overwhelming him. “What does it do? Was it an identifier or-”

Professor Brown pulled the book sharply back. “Don’t touch it either, Tin. I don’t know what’ll happen if you do, but it’s not gonna be good.”

“Oh.” He forced himself to shove his curiosity back into its cage. Then he looked at the door which was, he noted, was locked. From the outside. “This is pretty bad, isn’t it?”

Professor Brown’s smile was a sad one.

“We can’t win this, Tinvel.”

He stared, uncomprehending.

“If the Empire is really coming to fight us? All of it? With wyverns and griffons and gliders carrying tens of thousands of veteran soldiers?” Professor Brown seemed to search for that imaginary beer again, only to catch himself with a scowl. “We can’t beat that back. Not with what we have?”

“So?”

“So?”

Tinvel rapped his knuckles impatiently against the table. “I’ve met your daughter, remember. I know that’s not the end of it. What are we going to do about this?”

Professor Brown looked down, staring forlornly at the journal in his hands. Finally, as if it weighed a great weight, he slowly turned it around on the table. Tinvel read the first page’s large heading.

Technologies of Earth: The Brown Family’s Recollection

“Sara,” Professor Brown said, speaking in starts and stops, considering his every word with the utmost caution, “has, in light of recent developments, given you and Chona permission to read this. Not all of it, mind, but the parts about aviation, engines, and stuff like that. Technically speaking, you’re now cleared to know stuff even Garen doesn’t.”

Tinvel stared. There was a glossary beneath the title with dozens of entries, but he barely recognized one word in five. He scratched at his neck as, for some strange reason, he broke out in a sweat.

Professor Brown didn’t wait for him to catch his breath. He flipped open to a page that had a bookmark in it— one of dozens of bookmarks, Tinvel realized— and tapped the page.

“We’re not going to start with planes, though. We don’t have the slightest chance of copying what they were making back home. I’ll show you them eventually— jet engines and bombers and everything they used— but we’re going to start with something a lot simpler. Something that we can do while we’re still building up to the real heavy duty stuff.”

The diagram on the page was at once familiar and completely alien. Tinvel could tell at a glance that Sara’s illusions had been used to create the blueprints because the measurements were perfectly exact, precisely labeled on every axis. A meter long and seven centimeters in diameter, the sight of the rocket filled Tinvel with, of all things, an odd sense of pride. It was so close to what he and Chona had already made. Better, yes, obviously better, but Sara’s fear that her father had shared forbidden information suddenly made a lot more sense. They’d been damn close to something groundbreaking. He was downright proud of himself.

“These are just the basics,” Professor Brown said. “There’s a lot more I wish we could do, but I think hydra rockets are the limit of our manufacturing capability for now. We don’t have enough of an ammo stockpile for us to start equipping the air force with real weapons.”

Tinvel could all but hear the clatter of his burgeoning pride shattering. He looked up from the rocket, eyes wide.

“Dozens of plane-launched rockets aren’t real weapons?”

“Oh yeah, I haven’t gone into that yet, have I?” Professor Brown started flipping through the journal’s pages. “There’s a lot you don’t know, Tin. A lot. And since Sara doesn’t think she can stop those gliders from taking off, we’re gonna need to get you caught up.” He stopped on a page. “Ah, perfect. Like I said, we’re not quite there. We need a bigger stockpile of ammunition before we start deploying these, and our tooling just got built up for this a month or so ago. But you should know what the next generation of planes are going to be expected to achieve.”

When Professor Brown turned the book around again, showing the hastily-scribbled notes marking the sides of a terribly complex piece of machinery, Tinvel felt something squirming in his gut.

This war is going to get so, so much worse.

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Sara

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It turned out that the jungle hadn’t shown her all its miseries yet. Not through any fault of its own, as it was already pretty much the worst place she could imagine. No, it was because she’d finally lost the few luxuries she’d hadn’t even known she had.

The enemy was a hundred miles away. They were getting ready to run, and General Borek was not going to let them escape. That meant that the previous pace of operations, though they hardly could have been considered lazy, were now being left in the dust. The morning rains had been forgotten about. They were expected to be ready for marching the moment it was light enough for soldiers to see their own feet, and they weren’t to stop for any weather short of a typhoon. Meals were eaten cold, pulled from rain-soaked bags, and they were eaten on your feet. General Borek had made it publicly known that he expected the army to make twenty miles each day. Difficult but reasonable for a single traveler on open ground, but for an army hauling all its equipment through the jungle’s rainy season? Without any kind of pack animals? It was a brutal pace for even veteran soldiers.

The civilian camp followers, meanwhile, had been given a single order: keep up. If they fell behind, that wasn’t the army’s problem. From the Powdered Lead’s position at the rear of the column, Sara had already bore witness to several large groups dropping out, unable to continue. Abandoning the column meant abandoning the safety of its soldiers, which meant they had to leave in chunks of several hundred at a time. Only one gaggle of merchants had given up on the first day. She’d counted at least ten groups breaking off since the second day had begun. It was only going to get worse, and with every group of civilian merchants disappearing, the army’s informal supply reserve was being diminished.

Sara herself could have kept the pace easily. She had strength in spades, and by this point she’d spent literal years sparring with Evie on a daily basis, so stamina wasn’t an issue. Unfortunately, her goddamned conscience hadn’t let her just happily swing her legs past the miserable troops, bouncing freely on her divinely-granted Levels. No, not at all. Sara was covered in weeping, bloody sores. She’d joined the cannoneers in hauling the Powdered Lead’s artillery, making the best of her unnatural strength to ease their burden. The leather harness wore heavily at her skin no matter what she wore beneath, turning cloth and silk alike to little more than tattered rags in a matter of hours. Blood soaked the remains shortly after. That wasn’t the case for most of the artillery crews, but the clothing just couldn’t stand up to Sara’s strength, and that meant she ended up in an awful condition. Fearful of depleting their stocks of Selliana-provided potions, Sara had thus far refused to heal the sores and rashes until at least the end of the day. That meant she’d probably walk away from the effort sporting some new and interesting scars.

They were all doing their part in their own way. Hurlish could carry one of the artillery pieces on her shoulder, thank the gods. All twelve hundred pounds of a Napoleon cannon was resting on her broad back like a pole used to help carry buckets of water up from a well, the cannon’s empty limber hitched to her belt like she was a draft horse. She barely looked inconvenienced. She kept Tahn in her off-hand most of the day, though she occasionally traded him off to Evie, if for no other reason than their wife wanted a turn with him.

Tahn was starting to get up on all fours now. He’d be crawling any day. Thinking about that eventuality was one of the best ways Sara had found to distract herself from the march’s misery.

Evie, who once would have spent her day on administrative duties or flitting up and down the lines to ensure they stayed in step, had instead dedicated her time to Keo. The boy was used to being given free reign of the column when his father didn’t need him. Evie was finding it difficult to shake him of the habit, much to the consternation of her over-protective nature. Sara and Hurlish had managed to stifle their laughs thus far, but it wouldn’t be easy to keep that up for long. Evie couldn’t grasp the notion that no, most eight year olds don’t want to listen to a woman prattle on about sword and pistol forms for hours on end, and yes, they really would try to sneak away the moment said woman’s back was turned. Evie did well enough (surprisingly well, honestly) in caring for Keo when her full attention was on him, but she kept falling for the assumption that he’d keep following her orders exactly even when she wasn’t present. Sara had wanted to laugh at that so bad. The kid’s dad had beaten him senseless for coming to visit Hurlish on multiple occasions, yet he’d kept sneaking off to see her anyway. Why Evie thought he’d magically lose that rebellious streak around her, Sara had no idea.

Sara was pulled from her thoughts by a particularly ominous series of creaks and groans from the artillery limber’s wooden wheels. She might not be an artillery officer herself, but she’d been around the things long enough to know what they should sound like, and that wasn’t it. She strained her neck to look behind her, grunting at the two other crewmembers harnessed alongside her.

“You hear anything funny?”

One shook their head, but the other made a face, uncertain.

“Maybe. Kinda sounded like—”

With an abrupt noise, a spoke on the limber’s left wheel gave way. Sara cursed and shouted for a halt as quickly as she could, but it wasn’t quick enough. The first snap was joined by two others as the iron-rimmed wheel came around, the cannon’s weight bearing down on two more spokes that gave out in rapid succession. The cannon lurched drunkenly as Sara rushed to throw her shoulder against the limber to stop it from rolling onto yet more spokes, only for herself to find joined by a veritable horde of nearby mercenaries and soldiers. The artillery cannons were the entire army’s good luck charm, and everyone in earshot of the disaster threw themselves into the effort of saving the guns. Unfortunately, enough tried to leap and shove against the artillery piece that their combined momentum actually threw the ponderous weapon backward. The limber, already weakened, gave out under this unexpected assault. The wheel’s axle housing gave out with an even louder crack than the others, shattering so completely that the entire thing began to tip.

“Back!” Sara roared harshly. “Back, back, don’t get crushed!”

One golden gun of the Powdered Lead thumped into the mud with a splash. Sara stared at it, too tired to even curse. The artillery woman to the left of her was doing enough of it for the both of them regardless, ripping her helmet off to pound a fist into the padding again and again, emphasizing each profanity with another punch.

Behind them, Sara saw, and with her Blessings she felt, the entire rear quarter of the army began to react. The broken limber was blocking the way of a road that they’d already been making the most of. A massive traffic jam was instigated as troops tried to shuffle and shove to bunch together, hoping to get around the obstacle before the jam really got bad or, gods forbid, a halt to the march was called.

“Get it off the road,” Sara announced.

“Ma’am?” The artillery crewmember asked.

Sara pointed to the jungle wall. “Get it over there. I’m gonna go cut a patch out that’s large enough we can fix it. You, there, go get some carpenters from the Imperials, and the rest of you just… find some way to get it moving. I know the whole thing’s fucked. Just get it moved far enough that it’s out of the army’s way.”

Sara didn’t wait to acknowledge the chorus of yes ma’am! as she drew her sword, heaving the great black blade overhead like a headsman’s axe. She simply focused on tearing through the local flora as fast as she could, trying to create a space the carpenters could work in.

“Would you like some help with that, dear?” A prim voice offered. She heard the subtle sound of Evie’s rapier summoning itself into existence.

“Yeah.” Sara swung again, hacking at the base of a tree. “Try and clear those vines up there.”

“Of course.”

Two master swordsmen— or one and Sara, at least— turned their talents to clearing foliage. Sara sensed Keo appearing from the column, first to inspect what all the fuss was about, and then, upon seeing Sara and Evie, wandering over to inspect their work. He had a hand resting on the hilt of the little child-sized sidesword on his waist that Hurlish had made him as he approached, wide eyes watching them hack at the trees.

“Can I help?” He asked, doing a terrible job of hiding how eager he was to take his new sword out and swing it at something.

“I don’t know. Can you?” One of Evie’s ears rotated back toward the boy as she slashed at the vines. “These vines are thick, have tough skin, yet are frustratingly flexible when struck. How fares your practice with edge alignment?”

“I’ve been working on it!” He stepped forward, staring at one of the vines that Evie had left behind. It was wrist-thick, having been pulled halfway down by Sara’s hacking so that much of its length was now pooled loosely on the ground. Keo’s tiny hands grabbed his sword, preparing to draw it, then stopped himself.

“Oh! Um, Miss Evie? Can I take my sword out?”

“Will you be careful with it?”

“Of course!”

“Then you may.”

Sara hid her grimace as she heard the rasp of steel sliding from a leather scabbard. She really, really wished that Evie’s obsessive protective streak would extend to something like, say, not letting an eight year old walk around with a foot long fucking knife on his waist, but it didn’t. After growing up with her only true free time being found in the training halls of a mercenary company, there was no force in the universe that could have convinced Evie to forbid Keo from carrying a sword, and Sara didn’t have the heart to argue against it.

To the kid’s credit, he was honestly careful as he drew the weapon. He kept his eye on it the whole time, making sure he didn’t get it anywhere near his body, and he took it in both hands as soon as it was clear of the scabbard, holding it out in front of himself like the razor tip was boiling hot, hot enough to burn his skin if it got too close to him.

And, to Evie’s credit, the way he focused on the task at hand was pretty goddamn adorable. His tiny little face screwed up as he squinted at his green opponent, cheeks dimpling as he squinted at the dastardly vine. He twisted the sword’s hilt in his hands, feeling out the grip, and then looked down at his feet, shuffling them back and forth until he was in a decent-enough impression of a low guard.

Keo didn’t notice it, but the world around him slowed to a crawl as he prepared his swing. Evie and Sara were, despite looking for all the world like they were still hacking at the jungle, crackling with electric tension. If Keo so much as twitched in the wrong way, the sword would be out of his hands before he knew what happened.

He didn’t, though. Not in a dangerous way, at least. Taking a deep breath like he was about to enter the most important fight of his life, Keo lifted the sword to the side, readying himself to swing from right to left, aiming to cut the vine in half right at his chest level. He held the sword up for a little while, making tiny little adjustments (none of which were quite right, but at least he was trying) as he searched for a satisfying-feeling grip.

Damn, Sara thought as she watched him through her Blessings, say what you want about being raised by the world’s most violent throuple, he’s at least learning some damn good patience. I guess being taught by a duelist and a master smith will do that for you. She snorted at herself. He didn’t learn it from me, that’s for damn sure.

After maybe a minute spent inspecting his target, Keo decided he was ready to swing. He pulled the sword back just a little bit further, squinted harder, and then let out a hng! of effort as he swung.

The sword bit through the skin of the plant, traveled an inch further, and then twisted upward a touch, lodging itself in the meat of the vine. He’d made it about a third of the way through.

“Fuck!” He squeaked, giving the blade a jerk as he tried to free it.

“Keo!” Evie’s rapier disappeared as she whirled around, taking two quick strides toward the boy. “What did you just say?”

His eyes went wide. “U-u-um-”

“What makes you think that word was appropriate to utter?”

“I didn’t-”

“If you cannot control your language, why should I ever think you can control a blade?” Evie dropped to a knee, grabbing the vine just beneath his embedded sword. He stopped trying to free it as she met his eyes. “I have never used profanity around you, and I have so far been delighted that you have returned the courtesy. Until today, it would seem. What makes you think anything has changed?”

“B-but Miss Hurlish says it!” He knew better than to let go of his sword, but Sara could tell he wanted to point her way. “And she does, too!”

“That was before you were in our care,” Evie said sternly. “Things have changed. Not only that, you have a blade in your hands. There is no worse time to lose control of your impulses than when you are armed. I told you this, did I not?” When Keo didn’t immediately respond, she leaned in an inch. “Didn’t I?”

“Y-yes ma’am!” He sputtered out.

“I’m glad that you remember.” Evie pulled back slightly, turning her attention to Keo’s still-stuck sword. “And regardless, this was far from a blow worthy of such a profane outburst.”

He blinked. “Huh?”

Evie pinched the flat of Keo’s sword between two fingers, pulling it free. “This vine is tougher than human flesh, I would say. That you managed to strike it so deeply tells me that, were it a human opponent, your blow would be effective. Not ideal, no, and far from perfect, but perfection is a rare thing in combat. This strike was not worth uttering profanity over, Keo.”

He slowly stepped away as Evie released his sword, once more holding it well away from himself, treating it like the blade would kill anyone it touched. Once he was a ‘safe’ distance away, he looked at Evie, confused.

“So… that was a good swing? Even though I didn’t cut it?”

“In true combat, a blow is rarely good or bad. It is either effective or ineffective. This strike would have disabled an opponent’s limb or, if it hit their neck or head, led to bloodloss that would soon be lethal. That is effective.”

“But… you’re not calling it good.” He looked nervously up at her. “That means it wasn’t good, right?”

“Your edge alignment was poor, you did not follow through with your full strength, and you did not step forward with the swing as you should. However,” Evie stood, grabbing hold of the vine and stretching it taut. The core of the plant gushed watery fluids from its wide gash. “You have received less than a week of training with a sword, yet your first strike left your first opponent with a grievous wound. I am happy with your progress.” She eyed him. “Even if I’m not particularly pleased with your vocabulary.”

“Which means you did good, Keo,” Sara said between huffs of breath, still swinging away at the jungle. “She just loves using big words too much to say it the normal way. You still need to practice, but she’s happy with how you’re doing so far.”

“If you want to rob my explanation of all its nuance, yes.”

“He just wanted to know if you were mad at him, Evie. Not get an essay on his sword technique.”

It was Evie’s turn to blink in confusion. She looked down at Keo, concerned. “What? Why would you think I was mad at you?”

He stared up at her, as baffled as she was. “Um. Because of the bad word I said?”

“It’s only a word, Keo. Hardly something to get worked up over.”

His confusion visibly intensified. “But… then… why can’t I…?”

“It is a matter of discipline. Inability to control your verbal outbursts in public proves that you still lack—”

“Some rules are just weird,” Sara interrupted. “But you’ve got to follow them anyway. At least when you can’t get away with breaking them, anyway. A lot of them will probably make more sense later on, but for now you’ve just got to deal with it as best you can.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Nope,” Sara agreed, chuckling. “But I think we’ve all got too much work to do for us to try and explain it right now. You want to give that vine a second chop, see if you can hit the same spot?”

“An excellent idea.” Evie knelt down, holding the vine out between her hands, so that it was stretched horizontally. “Try an overhead blow this time. Take care not to strike me, of course.”

He stepped up to the vine, still holding his sword like it was a viper that might twist around to try and bite his face. He swallowed hard, looking at Evie. “U-um. You’re fast enough to move out of the way if I, um, swing too far, right?”

“You wouldn’t swing too far, would you?”

“She is,” Sara drawled tiredly. “Don’t worry about it.”

As Evie began coaching Keo through the intricacies of cutting a vine, Sara let her focus drift once more, immersing herself in the army’s hubbub. There wasn’t half as much chatting going on as there had been in weeks prior. Most soldiers were focusing on putting one foot in front of the other, looking up just often enough that they didn’t bump into the person ahead. So few people were talking that, for the first time, Sara had dark spots in her Blessing’s coverage of the army. Entire sections of the column weren’t talking, a wide enough stretch of relative silence that her Blessing’s couldn’t leapfrog past them. That wasn’t good, but there wasn’t anything to be done about it. Even this pace wasn’t fast enough.

Sara felt something tickle at her senses. She slowed her chopping, focusing inward. Someone about a quarter mile away had just half-heard another person shouting an apology. That had provoked a rippling reaction, conversations picking up around them. Details slowly filtered into her mind as people spoke, each working their way through…

Oh, goddammit.

Mayaran and her entourage were walking through the column, forcing soldiers to move aside as she went against the flow of traffic. The Imperial soldiers bowed out of her way with the utmost respect, turning their gazes to their shoes as she passed.

An entourage, though? Sara thought as she listened to the gossip. Mayaran was walking with no less than six guards at her side, it would seem. Wearing enchanted armor and holding glowing weapons, they were, apparently, quite the sight.

Sara smirked. Guess you weren’t as unbothered by that little late-night visit as you wanted to pretend, huh?

Since Sara had dropped off that photo in Mayaran’s tent, she’d not seen the woman for a single minute. Evie had, on a few brief occasions, but Sara herself? Nope. Mayaran had been avoiding her entirely. The rumor mill had it that Mayaran was too busy with the investigation into that bitchy lady’s murder, forgoing public appearances in the meanwhile, but that had always smacked of an intentional bit of hearsay to Sara. She’d felt pretty sure that Mayaran had used her allies to plant those rumors, preemptively controlling the narrative as best she could.

“Mayaran’s on the way over,” Sara said to Evie, stretching. “I’m going to go say hi. You’re in charge of unfuc-”

Evie glared, eyes flicking pointedly to Keo.

“Of unfudging the cannon,” Sara hastily corrected. “I’ll keep you posted.”

“Understood. Remember not to play with your food for too long, dear.”

“No promises.”

Sara didn’t go far to wait for Mayaran. She also didn’t change her tattered clothes, wipe off her sweat, or do anything to make herself look more presentable. She did sheathe her sword, but that was about it. It was one raggedy, messy-looking Chosen of Emotion that stood waiting for the elvish woman’s arrival. When she caught the first glimpse of a fancier-than-usual armored helm breaking through the crowd, she stepped forward and called out.

“Ah, there you are!” She waved, getting the leading man’s attention. “Mage Mayaran! We have much to discuss!”

The man changed course, leading the rest of the small group towards Sara. Mayaran was at the center, robes flowing in an unfelt breeze, her chin held high and dark eyes smoldering with imperious severity.

Oh, come on. If you wanted to hide the fact that I made you piss yourself you ran home to Mommy and Daddy, you probably should’ve shown your face sooner than this.

That was why Mayaran hadn’t shown up, Sara decided. The Honored Elven had been so unnerved by her little late night visit that she’d known better than to try and hide her fear in Sara’s presence. Since there was no hiding any emotion from Sara, she’d been forced to wait until her shock had faded to obscurity even within her own mind.

Fat lot of good that did you, bitch. Don’t even need my Blessings to figure out why you didn’t want to show up.

Sara stepped forward, stepping between the lead pair of guards as if she hadn’t noticed them. She offered her calloused, sweaty, blood-stained hand to Mayaran with a dazzling smile.

“It’s been too long. I hope that you received my correspondence regarding the petition to the Adjutant? This army is going to need every mage it can get in the coming days, and having an Honored Elven’s support will surely lend credence to our request.”

“I have not had time to peruse it properly, I’m afraid,” Mayaran replied, looking down at Sara’s disgusting hand. She didn’t shake it. “Though I believe that a written petition will be largely redundant. I have come on behalf of—”

There was an imperceptible pause in Mayaran’s words. Not something that anyone other than Sara would have noticed, barely more than a millisecond of hesitation, but it was there, and it was because she didn’t like what she was about to say.

“—the wyvern Fanlah. She is soon to arrive, having apparently offered her services in delivering several of General Borek’s chosen representatives to the capital.”

Interesting. Mayaran got a ride back to the army on Fanlah’s back, but she doesn’t like the wyvern? Something to look into.

“The capital?” Sara raised her eyebrows. “You mean the Imperial capital proper?”

“Yes. The Adjutants— both of the Adjutants— are preparing to give the Emperor a report on the state of his realm.” Though her expression was cordial enough, Mayaran spoke as if she were in the midst of rolling her eyes at Sara’s ignorance. “Seeing as you are so determined to beg for reinforcements, such a confluence of important individuals will be an exceptional opportunity for you to plead your case.”

“Oh? Beg? Do you think our army doesn’t need the aid?” Sara’s smile was sickly sweet. “If you have any spells capable of dealing with dozens of opposing wyverns, I would love to put them to the test against our mutual foes.”

“I’m afraid that I’m still a bit young for such a feat,” Mayaran said with a sigh, as if it were obviously only a matter of time until she reached such heights of power. “However, I am fully capable of recognizing the fact that this army has been subverted toward foreign goals. I protest the request for reinforcements because the defense of some human city-state on our frontier borders is hardly worth the effort that you want to ask of us.”

Saying the Empire should just abandon Tulian? That’s pretty goddamn blatant, Mayaran. Keep flying any higher and those wings of yours are gonna melt.

“And what of the financial investment, hm?” Sara hummed curiously. “The Tulian foundries are currently heavily occupied with the production of as many Napoleon cannons as they are physically capable of producing, yet, unlike the payment for them, not a single one has been delivered. Is it not in the Adjutant’s interest to defend his investment?”

The cannons, of course, weren’t going to be delivered for a long damn time. Evie and Vesta had dug their fingers deep into that contract, ensuring that the clause which allowed them to be retained for Tulian’s self-defense was so laughably broad that the mere existence of Sporatos could technically justify them not being sent away. That had been one way amongst many that Sara had planned to draw the Empire into the next Tulian-Sporatos war.

Mayaran, however, seemed indifferent to the prospect. She lifted her shoulders in a delicate shrug. “War is a terribly expensive affair, and some investments are riskier than others. It is no surprise that a handful will eventually fail to produce the value expected of them.”

Cute. Not gonna acknowledge the whole death and destruction side of a Tulian invasion though, are you?

“I expect the Adjutant will see the matter differently,” Sara said simply. Then she glanced skyward. “You said that Fanlah will be arriving today?”

“Any time now, in fact,” Mayaran nodded. A flicker of a smile ghosted across her lips. “I received the news from General Borek this morning, but found myself frustrated by a constant influx of other duties. I apologize that I did not inform you sooner.”

“Ah, it’s no matter.” Sara adjusted what was left of her shirt, then pointed. “I believe that is her, in fact.”

“Her?” Mayaran asked, turning to point at the patch of sky Sara was pointing at.

A purple blur no larger than a gnat was visible, two thin lines of leathery wings beating quickly through the sky. With her back turned to Sara, Mayaran seemed to think that the sneering scowl she let crawl across her face would go unnoticed. By the time the elf turned back her way, it was replaced by the same meaningless smile.

“Ah. You mean the wyvern Fanlah herself, it would seem. Even faster than I would have believed! What fortuitous timing.”

“Very,” Sara agreed. They were both lying out their asses.

“I will be going to greet her, then,” Mayaran announced, turning around. “I will see you shortly, I assume?”

“Nah.” Sara hooked her thumbs in her belt loops and pulled her pants up, hopping forward. “I’ll come with you, I think. Evie will keep things under control while I’m gone.”

When she looked back this time, Mayaran couldn’t hide her sneer as she glanced up and down Sara’s body.

“You are not going to… freshen yourself up?”

“Nope!” Sara hit Mayaran with another blinding smile, a beautiful optimism radiating from every pore. “I’ve been real eager to meet Fanlah myself. I was pretty sad that I missed her the other day, and I heard she was interested in seeing me, too. Wouldn’t want to keep her waiting.” Sara bent forward in a half bow as she waved Mayaran forward. “Of course, I wouldn’t want to intrude on your plans. If you have somewhere else to go, I’ll take my leave. If not, lead the way, Honored Elven.”

A bitter smile met her own. “Of course not, Chosen. I would be delighted to have your company.”

They set off together, Sara humming a little tune the whole way through.

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