Art by Melissa Conway and N.A. Soleil
Narrated by Shae Strong and Randell Moore
After the revelation that Kuhll was the liech, Hesa shakily excused herself. The Golden Paladin stayed back briefly to talk with her, but Lief and Baleraphon went their separate ways. A full revolution of the sun had passed since then, and Bale had gone back to his usual duty of sorting through the people wandering into camp.
“Thank you so much, sir.” Bale smiled and waved at the man who bowed himself out of the wagon, then let his head loll back as he blew out a sigh.
The stream of refugees was endless.
Well. Maybe that shouldn’t be a surprise. The mages had spread across most of the continent, after all. The cities had been badly affected, yes; but the farming and artisan villages dotting the landscape in between had mostly been all but razed.
Frankly, it was a miracle they were finding as many survivors as they were.
And, luckily, as well, there had been comparatively few devotees to Merlin attempting to infiltrate them. So Bale’s duties mostly included meeting with people as they stumbled into the camp (sometimes often literally), interviewing them, and deciding what part of the camp to send them to next.
He’d seen a lot of broken faces recently.
Most people needed some kind of medical care or rest before being put to work, but there was the occasional hardy individual — mercenaries or people who lived in the wilderness, mostly — who could be placed immediately.
That was to say …
“Guhhh, this is borinnngggg,” Bale lamented to no one in the quiet of the nightbound wagon that had been designated as his.
The wagon flap lifted and a large head filled the gap. Tiann’a grinned. “I heard that.”
Bale snapped to sit upright. “Tiann’a!”
He hadn’t had much time to interact with her since she’d been assigned as the Golden Paladin’s second-in-command, even though they’d run into each other relatively often when they’d both still been living in Arthur’s Kingdom.
GP didn’t suffer idle hands — and he’d even specifically made it clear that he “didn’t need a secretary,” as he’d put it — so Tiann’a had probably been the most busy out of all of them. GP had his generals, who had their own troops, so training or combat related orders went through them. But it was on Tiann’a’s back that the army was even still marching — logistics, resources, food and water, scouts, coordinating noncombatants, and even helping handle the refugees.
Which was probably why she was there at Bale’s flap. She confirmed it when she lifted a huge hand to wiggle a bound stack of what was probably paperwork in his direction.
“No, don’t do it. Not more paperwork! I can’t!” Bale moaned, lowering himself to lay his upper body across his desk. “I’m not built for this! I need a sword in my hand, not a pen!”
Tiann’a snorted. “So childish. You do need these; they’re the updated headcounts of which areas of camp need people the most.”
“Ugh, fine.” Bale relented and stretched a hand out to meet the arm that barely fit into the wagon, taking the bundle from her. As he pulled at the twine binding it, he asked, “How have things been looking out there?”
“As well as can be expected,” Tiann’a said, casting a reflexive glance behind her. “We’ll be in trouble if we get delayed again, though.”
“Oh? We’re only a few days away from Liallynn Mielwyn, right?”
“At our current pace, yes. But if it takes any longer than that, we’ll have to start rationing food or slaughter some of our reserve beasts. And it’s a little early in the campaign to be dipping into our emergency supplies.”
“Bummer.”
Tiann’a narrowed her eyes at him, which he skilfully ignored.
“Hey, why can’t we magic up food, anyway?” Bale asked.
“Do I look like a mage to you?”
A shout from outside warned him that he had someone else to speak to, so he called out to the organizers to send them in. Tiann’a kept the flap open for them; she must have needed to talk to Bale more, because she didn’t leave.
The person that ducked into the wagon was a shifty-looking, small man dressed in dusty leathers and worn cloth. That wasn’t itself unusual. A lot of these people had been through hell, after all.
But Bale’s well-honed danger senses perked up as soon as the man drew within a few feet, and the knight had to bite back a grin. He leaned onto his elbows on the table, clasping his hands together with fingers interweaved.
“Welcome, welcome. I’m glad you made it here safely.”
The man mumbled something indistinct in response.
“So,” Bale continued, “I know you’re probably very tired. Let’s get some basic information from you for now, and you can head off to a resting area.”
The man nodded.
“We’ll start with name, origin, profession, reason for joining us.”
“Jayk, Starfire, thief, my master Merlin decreed that anyone who could successfully steal intel from your caravan would be rewarded with power beyond all measure.”
Jayk, as he was speaking, began to look more and more horrified; by the time his jaw snapped shut on the final words, his face was a pale mask taut with fear.
Bale let the grin he’d been holding back bloom on his face. “Is that so?” he asked, voice soft and deadly.
Jayk the thief bolted upright out of the chair, knocking it over in his haste, and scrambled for the entrance to the wagon — right into Tiann’a’s waiting palm. Her fingers, each one about ten inches long, folded over his torso, almost completely encircling him.
He shrieked and thrashed, drawing attention. A few of the closer infantry ran up cautiously, obviously trying to figure out if they needed to intervene or assist. Tiann’a waved her free hand as she stood, hoisting the still-screeching man up double his height off the ground.
He seemed to gather himself somewhat and went to reach for something, but Tiann’a perfunctorily flipped him upside-down and held him by both ankles, shaking him back and forth like a rug that had gathered too many crumbs. The dagger he’d been reaching for fell out of its sheath and clattered to the ground, as well as some of the looser items on his person. Tiann’a performed a brief search for any better-attached weaponry, then flipped him back upright.
Bale stepped out of the wagon, casting an apologetic glance up to the half-giant woman.
“Sorry about this,” he said, “but do you mind taking him over to the mages?”
Tiann’a sighed. “Fine.” She glared at the would-be thief, who had thankfully shut his trap by that point. “You’re going to regret messing up my night, little man.”
As she clomped across the camp with long strides, adeptly avoiding the much smaller people and structures in her way, Bale shook his head. “Why do they bother…?”
Clicking his tongue as one would to a naughty puppy, Bale ducked back into the wagon.
We gave Hesa a break this month and showed you some of Bale’s regular duties, but we’ll be back with the action next month as the army grows ever closer to the beastfolk city of Liallynn Mielwyn!
N.A. Soleil is a portmanteau pseudonym of the two authors' names.
