Rodelkog: Konrad Louffen, Marius Panayi, Vicquerno van Szaalm, Krasimir
Cowritten with
@TokyoPewPew &
@TesserachKrasimir
The grizzled man looked tired. Both Krasimir's worn breastplate and the red cloth bands of cloth he wore tied around the muddled brown material that clothed the man were all caked in dirt. He sat, groaning as he fell heavily into the seat. "We second that. Skotinodasos and I, the others with us, we talked it out. Getting bogged down in a siege. Looking for another big fight. We just don't see the advantage in it; it doesn't play to our strengths." Krasimir's voice was low and gravelly as he nodded towards Szaalm. He leaned back in the chair, and removed his sword with its dented and beaten looking and set it across his lap. He shifted around in the seat, looking for a comfortable position for his leg before finally settling in.
Louffen let out a guffaw of laughter, though Panayi did not look overy amused at the prospect of giving up on the city of Inbur, "Well if we could get the army through Jedgorsy territory I would say the same. Head home to Mitteland. We'd be in a better position to gain the support of the Independent human Kingdoms."
"We are here to restore the Inburian throne," Panayi replied testily, "Control of the city is as important to help establish the legitimacy of the heir.
"
Leeeee-gitimacy." Enunciated such, the word had a tacky, chalky texture, scratching and raking Szaalm's parched throat on its way up like a vomit of pounce and sawdust. The way it stumbled out like he was wont to choke thereon; how his tongue smacked and chewed upon it—while his eyes roamed the erstwhile elf-lord's fine tabletop, seeking the reprieve of a tankard, craving ale. Still, despite their dry, croaking mouthfeel, something dripped from the syllables, wet and venomous. Contempt. A deep, potent aversion to the taste, nay, the very idea they represented as they lolled over his tongue and past his gleaming teeth. Szaalm hardly feared Panayi's scorn as did some at this table thus gathered, tiptoeing their words and their gestures around certain—delicate sensibilities. To him, coaxing and stoking and prodding flames from the embers of the moneylender's patience was practically a game. "This is why we should throw three, four thousand gentle-soldiers and nine thousand God-fearing freedmen into the grindplate?—so as they die fruitlessly they know they deserved better?—all this—this—
'legitimacy' of ours?"
"Yes, Sir, it is," Payani replied boldly and without a hint of shame in his answer, "The good men of this country flock to our banner because the Lady Ariana has a rightful and just claim to the throne. We have an Empress," he said, pointing upwards towards the ceiling either because that was where Ariana was or as a gesture towards heaven, "We have laws and liberties but all have been suppressed for two centuries and many of the commoners have forgotten that this land is not the domain of the brutish elgafolk who have usurped all our titles and estates. This is not the natural order but it has stood for so long that they need to be reminded. So I tell you, Sir, legitimacy is important. It is how we encourage the common folk to continue to rise up. Capturing Inbur would send a message that God himself has blessed our task."
Krasimir made an effort to prop himself up in his seat, adjusting his leg three times as Payani spoke while struggling to find a comfortable sitting position. Finally he seemed to give up on the whole endeavour and drew still. "Forgive me if I misspeak sirrahs, but I've hardly slept a wink since the battle. We been in the field, pressing day and night. And from where we stand, symbols of legitimacy, taking Inbur - it's all well and good - but the legitimacy we desperately need now comes from having supplies, powder, weapons, and way more men than we do. The Whites and Blacks both have more professional fighting men than we do and the men we do have: you saw how they were. Let us speak plainly among ourselves. Another 'victory' like Rodelkog will be the ruin of us all. The Haltians are a leviathan: they can afford to lose men, lose battles, lose armies and still win. Us? We can't afford to slip up once. We do and we're all dead men. Rodelkog was their
detritus, good sirs. If they put together a proper field army and come at us... what do we have? A handful of Owned Men? Some fellows who've never handled a weapon and hardly had a square meal these last few years?
Legitimacy? We need supplies. We need powder. We need better weapons and we need more men and the time to train and drill them until they're ready to put the fear into them that mean to keep us down. And good sirs, I think if you'd seen what we been seeing out there you'd agree..." He twisted in a movement that looked like it greatly pained him in order to point outside. "All the things we need are ripe for the taking. We just gotta be smart about how we take 'em."
"This is what I have advised," Louffen replied, "Powder in particular is in short supply. It would be beneficial if we moved our base of operations to a more coastal location where we can purchase what we need from a nation inclined towards our cause," he paused momentarily, "Bear in mind I have not fully thought this through, but what if we march North to the North Coast near Grendell. Their forces there are unlikely to leave the defence of the causeway and we could seek a contract with the Brendahlanders."
Szaalm had listened well—mayhap not
"intently" per sē, but respectfully at the least. It was nothing he hadn't heard already half a hundred times, oozing gormlessly from the table's more naïve corners. Apparently the high hopes and goodwill of the commons would, by Providence alone, make bread appear in the troops' bellies, and powder in their pans (or if not that, then it would see them in high spirits through all the starving and the fleeing and the dying). And that Morktree heretic—undoing, by his indiscriminate, wholesale savagery, Szaalm's carefully cultivated image of a gentlemen's army, an army which would only harm the longears and their cringing lickspittles—of course he did not even at that very instant blather in tongues through this "Krazimir," this skin-shifted freak of an emissary. And on and on. Usually Szaalm let the brim of his hat cast down over his eyes, that he needn't waste precious, finite patience on staying them in civilized places, keeping them from rolling away at the absurdity of it all. Usually a bite of his tongue sufficed to still that, likewise, "In all a most salient appraisal, general. I've but one concern," he said. But his was a seething sort of sneer, the foremost of many little tics which betrayed that statement as a falsehood. In fact his entire being itched with such tells, if a man was keen enough of eye to glean them. Something else gnawed at Szaalm, something which runneled deeper than the question he had bided so long to broach: "Will north truly deliver us from our demise, or fling us to its doorstep?
"The Haltians have made their fair share of enemies, there's wisdom in making common cause - even delaying Lady Ariana's claim until we're ready to march on Inbur if we can haggle supply from the other claimants. In the meantime we've been moving through the countryside. Liberating farms, estates. There's three dozen wagons laden with supplies, a few weapons, even some powder, arriving within the next few days. There's more behind them. The largest estate we raided added some 300 field workers to our force on it's own." The veteran groaned and twisted back the other way in his seat, reaching into the folds of his tunic to withdraw a piece of parchment that he stretched and set on a table between the men gathered there. "This a map of the lands east of the Morktree, marked with every major estate and work site we've been able to identify housing more than 100 workers. You'll notice one in particular we circled."
"The King in Brendahland has clashed with the Haltians for many years," Louffen pointed out, "He may support us with supplies, perhaps aid with the funding of a Jedgorsy host. At the very least he would place no obstacles to trade between us and his subjects. It works to his benefit to damage the Empire as much as possible. Should we advise her Majesty to send an emissary, perhaps?" the General suggested.
Once more Szaalm listened—once more with something itching at him. Something beyond the smothering heat within that stained glass-lit room, many-fingered with tendrils of milky smoke guttering from several colonels' pipes. (Another non-secret about the man: he had quit smoking, a lifetime's habit, just before joining up with the Crimson Wyvern. Something about the hypocrisy of a soldier of freedom indulging in a luxury watered by slaves' tears, nourished by slaves' blood.) Two of his chairlegs rapped the hardwood floor, next the heels of his boots. The cushions sighed as he relieved them of his weight. Now standing, his attention seared across the table, though his words remained civilized for the time; deferent. "An error, sir, methinks. If I may expound."
"Emissaries are cheap." Krasimir observed shifting the map around on the table and shifted back in his seat while regarding Szaalm with a wry smile. "But let's hear it, since you're like to tell us anyhow."
"Emissaries are cheap "
Are they!" exclaimed the colonel. "Someone should tell your Mad Priest once he's returned from the latest rampage. He'll be most grateful to know he overpaid."
Krasimir remained silent for a moment fixing his eyes on Szaalm for a time before responding. "Thank you for your sober minded and well-rested opinion sir." He affected a grizzled grin of missing and darkened teeth. "I believe sirrah had an expositon?"
"Emissaries are not cheap," Payani put in, "They represent our Court to the Court of another ruler and must be trusted to do so with dignity and respect."
"My apologies. I'm a humble soldier and ignorant of the cost of such lordly dignities." Krasimir affected a conciliatory tone before muttering, under his breath. "Wait till you tally what fielding an army costs..."
"Even for an empire," Szaalm agreed. He looked once more to Louffen though this time with something vaguely resembling pity, almost apologetically. What was the use, he wondered, in installing a chain of command if no one would defer to his superiors, if clueless money men and cultists could shout themselves over those with experience and competence? If ruminating over the matter at hand only left one liable to be forsaken and forgotten at the war table, left behind like some codger, his silence buried under sophistry and blind zeal?
"Away with the suspense, then?" said the colonel, seeing no more reason to await permissions which may never come. "Look. Voron has four armies beating at his gates, four pretenders howling for his blood; and only half an army of his own, for as long as he means to garrison the rest at Grendell. I needn't tell you, gentlemen, half an army against four is a fool's calculus for
any commander, and Voron is no fool at all. He and all his symbols and cities are not our chief concern right now. Not while he saves his strength for his brother and turns the rest of us upon each other like starving wolves. To survive this war, we must first survive the second army with whom he will break bread. And I'd wager hat and horse that I know who will soon so happen to be at his doorstep, groveling for audience.
"Yes," Louffen agreed with a nod, twisting the end of his moustache in a gesture of either nervousness or frustration, "Pray though, how do you propose we do that? We have ordinance but our powder supplies are limited. I would advise we head North, take a coastal town and attempt to secure a supply of powder and weapons," he repeated, "That way we allow the Calarians, Voron and that damned pirate D'Ambois grind their forces to dust while we train our troops and prepare for a campaign."
"That's the rub, general." Szaalm had that entire time been standing. There was no grand gesture chosen to accompany his words, no sweep of his hands or leather-squeaking grip around the trim at table's edge; nothing but grave sincerity. "If I'm correct, 'tis Coralie D'Ambois who will soon wear Voron's jeweled leash."
"Potentially," Louffen conceded, "What would you have us do? March South and attempt to catch her off guard?"
"If the chance presents. We mustn't allow jovial airs and a few priggish smirks to deceive us, however: hers is a desperate situation. Mercenaries eating up three times the pay of the average fellow-soldier. Mariners and pirates expecting their fair share of every hoard. And of course the gullible masses who have flocked to her. Each of these a mouth to feed. All plumped up by a few easy victories, aye, but knaves and cowards all; sooner to desert once the tides turn. If not mutineer outright.
"She, too, is no idiot—imbued, as she is, with her peculiar......low cunning. She
knows she needs a steady income to satisfy the sellswords, which for now she satisfies by plunder. But she cannot for very much longer risk enraging the empire, and so she wants nothing better than a parlay, resulting in a letter of marque for our heads; whereby to keep drawing cheap victories from ambushed peasants, rather than take a welting from a trained army. An incensed, vengeful army, of course, after how many knights' estates she's burned."
Szaalm at last had set himself amarch; a slow, sauntering pace he kept around the table, once, then a second time. All the while dragging his fingertips across the backs of their chairs, the colonels and the merchant and the commander, with a gingerly tenderness which almost evoked a white-glove inspection for dust.
Twice, in all, had he circled the table. Nearly finished with his piece, however, he found himself returned unto the place he'd started. And so with a rakish fall and a rakish slump he restored himself to the creaking and mewling of his chair.
"A natural match, is it not? Voron ends the rape along the coast, and exterminates our darling Ariana without once troubling his numbers. Coralie secures silver for her cutthroats, and cherrypicks an easy campaign whereon to prop up her preposterous farce of a conquest. Of this I am convinced: she's our first great hindrance on the march to Inbur—and all that legitimacy we so covet."
"Skotinodasos and I talked about The Blacks before I come here sirs. If we go south we got two rivers to put between us and the Imperials and to help us manage supply. Between the Blacks and the Calarians, I think we can find leverage. Now we can go north, but we need something to offer - and no matter which way we go we think we found something people been overlooking in all their fixation on fortresses and armies." He lurched awkwardly forward again and tapped the map he'd previously laid out on the table again. "That circle, gentleman, is the largest mine in the eastern Empire. No walls. Local garrison's... maybe 300? No more than 500 fellas in barracks: there to keep all those miners in line, they aren't ready for us, that's for sure. They got a whole
army of slave miners to run herd on. Plus supplies and..." He paused for dramatic effect, his crooked, broken smile growing wider. "Lots of powder stores, for blasting out a whole heap of rock. And while Skotinodasos and I been out there kicking up dust in the empire's faces: we already put out feelers to them there willing to help us. They're ready to rise, fellas. We do this, we can go north, we can go south. Oh, and do any of you learned gentlemen know what largest mine in the eastern empire pulls out of them rocks that draws so many fellas down below?"
"So we head South and face off against D'Ambois," Louffen scratched his chin, then nodded, "I had imagined D'Ambois might create a distraction to divide Imperial attention in Inbur, but you make a fair point. I would not put it past a woman of her character to join with the Empire if it served her purposes. I would not support a move against the mine," he added, "I would rather march against D'Ambois before she manages to secure her position on the Coast and if we capture the mine we can expect the Imperial forces at Inbur to counterattack in short order meaning we'd need to divide our army."
"I disagree," Payani shook his head, "We need the funds to purchase supplies."
"If we can take a position on the South coast and take D'Ambois off the board, we may be able to secure a supply from the Monchians," Louffen countered, "They are supporting her in a manner but I imagine it is more to destabilise the Empire than due to any particular love of her - she is a pirate after all."
His estimation done, his entreaty a triumph—yet paying the price in his mouth, his throat—the droughty Szaalm leaned back into his chair and endeavored to conserve the last of his voice (cursing, to himself, whoever had called for this summons without first putting out tankards). He nodded his capitulation over to the rest of the table, and over the finer details he offered little squabble, for they marched, now, in the safer direction; their convictions perhaps emerging yet from the kiln of battle without cracking. He reckoned he should be grateful enough for that, and leave the rest to God.
He did wonder, however. Doubtlessly had the pirate whelp forged few friendships in her years, and fewer still on steady grounds—allegiances wrought of fear and submission, hardly of any mutual trust between parties. Surely, ergo, if Coralie moored her ships at sea while rowing ashore to terrorize the manors, she risked any number of fates at the hands of the aggrieved. Navies and privateers and merchant fleets—any one of these could come up behind the occupied army, loot the unguarded holds; scuttle the ships, and leave her stranded aground with no good way of transporting her troops, nor guarding her plunder. She, for her part, had somehow avoided this fate for some weeks already.
She needed row inland, Szaalm concluded—hide her fleet upriver, as far as bank and bridge permitted. Until she'd bluffed her way into a pitying port of call. But what port would take pity on a pirate? And until that port becked her in, up which river would she cower? Again—he wondered.
To his right sat one of his fellow officers; Chauncey, if he remembered true. Yes, that was it. Colonel Chauncey. Szaalm leaned over into his elbow, gathered some much-needed spit on his tongue, and was seen croaking in a low whisper: "Were you there, sir, when they captured the ordnance on the field? If you shouldst chance to know it, what is the poundage on those four-and-thirty guns?"
The Colonel leaned across, keeping his voice low to avoid interrupting the others, "Mostly sakers and a few minions, from what I saw, Sir."
"Enough sakers fired in broadside, thinks ye, to sink a polacre at tenscore yards?"
"I would be surprised if her ships are carrying anything bigger," Louffen chipped in, "They are a mixture of small raiding vessels, not line ships."
Szaalm's head turned hardly a moment after nodding his thanks to his neighbor. "So be they," he ceded, small in voice and unfazed in demeanor. "Perhaps a worthy target, shouldst we learn where she means to lay anchor. Commandeer the ships if we can, solving our money dilemma by ransom; if not, scuttle them."
"If they're careless it might be done - but she's a risky gambit. Your people need time to drill, as it stands they'll never beat professional fighters in an even fight. Try and tackle the Blacks now, you're jumping head first into a back alley knife-fight. You're as likely to lose them big guns you're so proud of as not." Krasimir grumbled. "In the meantime,
this..." he tapped the map for emphasis again. "... is legitimacy. Coin. Powder. Men. Let's take it, yeah? Keep the pressure on the Empire, send feelers out to the Calarians and the Blacks - and the Brendahlanders too if we like - keep our options open."
And so continued the bickering. Poured it steadily from the wellsprings of the table's more contentious members, while erupting also from once-quiet corners, stirring even some of the meekest of the thirteen colonels to petition. And so it would continue, for as long as Louffen and Payani would allow it; for as long as they, themselves, could not agree. One's pragmatic cynicism, and the other's ambitions—two cats of different coats, both recalcitrant and fierce.
And while they glowered and sneered across the table from their high seats, one chair sat higher yet between them, positioned at the table's very head—though vacant it was, and silent, and powerless to unite them.
Men muttered and whispered what they would about their girl-queen, but the general and the merchant harked when she spoke and that meant power, real, backed, cogent. Surely Szaalm was not alone in praying she would burst through that door, assume command from her two acting superior officers, and end this abominable stalemate. More likely she had other matters to attend to, however—remarkably important-seeming to young girls. (One could only hope she was not debasing herself like her sister.)
Alas. Their fates, for the time, left in the hands of the money man and the turncoat, there was nothing else for it. Szaalm steepled his hands, leaned over, and watched. Waited. Expected.
And almost as an immediate answer to that prayer the door at the end of the modest hall was pushed open by one of the veteran halberdiers who acted as guards to the Royal person. Ariana was a pretty thing who had, by all accounts, existed in the shadow of her older sister. She lacked Andronika's brazen confidence, relying more on her advisors to dictate a course of action for her. Right now she looked a lot like a hind who had wandered into a clearing only to discover a hunting party enjoying a midday respite.
Louffen and Payani rose politely then, as soon as the initial exchange of pleasantries was complete, immediately set about outlining their various viewpoints to her, clearly hoping she would weigh in on the discussion. Ariana looked distinctly uncomfortable, biting the corner of her lip in concern, though finally she raised a hand, "Gentlemen," she addressed the group, "There are divers opinions in this room over the right course of action, though it seems the two most favoured are to march against my Cousin on the South coast or to march on this silver mine. Mister Krasimir, Colonel van der Szaalm, I appreciate that I am not one with the wisdom to make this decision, but I pray I am able to discern wisdom when I hear it. Kindly, could you please put your best case forward for your course of action and I will decide from that."
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