Book 5 - Chapter 21

Back at the Order’s camp, Lyssa was waiting for them. She still had an arm in a cast, but Brin was glad to see she’d kept it at all. He wasn’t sure if the healers would be able to keep it. That wasn’t the only sign she wasn’t at her best. She still wore her heavy makeup but even with it Brin thought she looked exhausted, like she hadn’t slept at all since Galan was nearly assassinated.

“Come. I’ll escort you,” she said.

Cid looked like he wanted to follow the pages who’d come for their horses. He looked down and gestured, “Like this?”

“Like that is better,” said Lyssa. “Did you think the officers and [Strategists] guiding this war would shrink at the sight of a little blood? Because you’d be right. And that’s the point. Come.”

She turned and walked, and the Lance had no choice but to follow. Brin realized they really were a mess. They’d only seen one or two short moments of combat, but he didn’t realize how dirty fighting made you until he’d been asked to go meet some bigwigs right after. They were all splashed with mud from the galloping horses, and most of them had healthy amounts of blood splatter on their arms and legs. Aeron hadn’t noticed it yet, but Brin was pretty sure there was a human tooth wedged on the back of his vambrace. How that had ended up there was anyone’s guess.

Marksi found them along the way. He looked pristine as always. Which was an interesting question; the little dragon didn’t groom himself like a cat and Brin never washed him. Did mud and blood just not stick to him? That sounded right. Appropriately dragon-like.

He actually didn’t know what Marksi had been up to in all the fighting. He might have been fighting alongside his beast friends, or he might’ve been hunting the horde of stray cats that fed on the rats that inevitably followed an army. Or he might’ve been napping.

He ran straight up to Brin for a head scratch, but then fell back to Cowl and Anwir so he could point at their new weapons. They were more than happy to tell him all about it, and Brin was glad to see Marksi getting along with other members of the Lance and not just him.

They moved across the gap between the commander’s camp and the rest of the army. Brin tried to pretend that this wide space didn’t make him nervous now. He noticed that Lyssa increased her speed a little, so he wasn’t alone. It should be safe; they’d stationed teams of [Scouts] and [Hunters] to patrol the space and make sure no invisible assassins were creeping up, but that was logic speaking and fear wasn’t always logical. From now on, he’d always be nervous crossing this divide.

They entered the commander’s camp without trouble, and Brin was overcome with a moment of disorientation when they entered. The entire thing was different. None of the tents were where they’d been last time he was here. He could spot the amphitheater where Cid had had his meeting, but nothing else was the same. Rather than three camps, it was unified now, and he didn’t know any of the tents well enough to tell what kind of organization they’d settled on.

It shouldn’t have bothered him as much as it did because he’d only been in here once, and he didn’t have the greatest memory for directions and places, but he’d also sent out dozens of Invisible Eyes. When the threads directing them had all returned, he’d absorbed their memories, so all combined, it was the same as spending weeks in here.

He gave up trying to figure out directions and just followed Lyssa. First she came to a large green and black tent. She peeked her head inside and then back out. “They aren’t ready for us. Hm. I know what we can do. Come along, I bet you’ll find this interesting.”

She led them down the street to a new tent. This was much more plain and practical looking, just a big long tarp covering an area the size of a basketball court. It was heavily guarded with two full plated soldiers at the entrance and the back, which was interesting because even the first tent they’d looked at hadn’t actually had guards.

When they approached, Lyssa eyed the Lance, considering. “Perhaps just Sir Gurthcid and Sir Brin for this. With apologies to the rest of you, we won’t be long.”

He expected some grunts of disappointment or maybe some snide comments, but the other members of the Lance just saluted her and stepped back. Even Govannon was being normal for once. Brin shrugged and followed Lyssa inside. Marksi came too, of course, and Lyssa didn’t say anything, so Brin assumed it was fine.

Inside, they saw trash. Plainly put, there were broken shields, shattered swords, polearms bent in half, dented lanterns, cracked luggage, mangled jewelry, and that was just what he could identify. Random shards of wood, what looked like a glass orb that had been broken in a hundred pieces, torn shreds of cloth, and rubble of every kind. Some of it was in haphazard piles, but most of it was very carefully arranged, sometimes with chalk outlines drawn on the ground around every piece. Men and women in robes or formal suits picked through it here and there. [Scholars], mostly, but there was one [Examiner] and Brin did not like that there was an [Examiner]. He moved so that the rest of the Lance was between him and the man, and then put a Mirror Image on top of himself so that he could use [Say What's True]. There’s absolutely no reason to suspect I’m anything other than a [Knightly Conjuror of Glass]. No need to [Inspect] me.

Luckily, none of the [Scholars] or otherwise gave him more than a passing glance. The few that looked up only had eyes for Marksi. Wary eyes, and with good reason. Marksi bounced around the broken artifacts as if looking for something good to eat. He probably wouldn’t… hopefully.

Lyssa led them to the center of the tent to where a huge black lance lay on display, broken in the center.

It still had Galan’s blood on it.

“Is that… is that really it?” Cid asked.

Lyssa nodded down at it with forced neutrality. “It is. We’ve retrieved every piece of the weapon. Not so much as a single splinter was left behind. This, along with every other notable artifact we capture from Arcaena, will be thoroughly studied.”

There really were splinters laid out neatly near the weapon, showing precisely where they would all fit if reassembled. Looking at it now, the break on the lance looked closer to the way that wood broke.

“It’s made of wood? What makes a wooden lance split armor like that?” he asked.

“It’s not any wood that we’ve heard of. Our best guess is that someone has a method of creating metallic plants. Something like that. One thing we do know, no other weapons captured from Arcaena’s side display these qualities. She lost something valuable with this attempt,” said Lyssa.

“A bitter victory,” said Cid.

Lyssa grunted in agreement, and though her face stayed passive, there was a long moment before she spoke again. “We’re studying every facet of that event. The way the wight used illusion to cover his approach. The abilities he displayed. And of course his rapid retreat. We’ve seen that Skill on other battlefields. Jhaartael has been fighting openly on the northern front, and he has demonstrated the same escape Skill. Sana the [Witch Mage] has demonstrated something similar on the western front. Anyway, I supposed I just thought you’d like to see it. We should be going.”

There was a lot to unpack in that story. First was the escape Skill. Brin hadn’t thought about it at all, but now reviewing his memories he could see that it was much different than the standard [Witch] transforming retreat. The assassin, had she called him a wight? He’d actually faded away, not flown away. If the enemy's highest leveled combatants were safe from death and the allies weren’t, victory might not be as assured as Brin had started to assume.

The walk back out of the tent didn’t leave him a lot of time for questions, so he picked his carefully. “You said you’re looking into the illusion he used to approach. Did you find something? Is that why Arcaena hasn’t been cloaking her army in illusion any more?”

“No,” she said flatly. “We have no idea why that is.”

He stared at the ground, chewing on his lip. He’d spent so much time around [Knights] that he’d gotten used to how forthright they were. Lyssa wasn’t a [Knight]. He didn’t think she was secretly a traitor or a spy, not anymore, but that didn’t mean he could trust everything she said. She could lie, and she would if she had a reason to. She had to know something about the illusions.

It wasn’t something that could be solved now. They met up with the rest of their Lance. Brin released the illusion he’d put on himself, trying to tamp down on the paranoia that had led him to make it in the first place. Had Lyssa really brought them in there to see that lance, or maybe was it so that the [Examiner] could see him? Had he done enough to hide his Class? Too much? These thoughts could spin in circles forever, never going anywhere.

 When they returned to the tent, Lyssa poked her head in again. Apparently, she decided that this was the right time because she entered without looking back. Cid went next, and Brin followed with the rest of the Lance.

Inside, the tent could’ve been the sitting room of one of Hogg’s fancy hotels. Fine furniture, a lush carpet on the ground, little tables with potted plants, there were even paintings on the walls, an application of Skillcraft that Brin wasn’t sure he understood.

The Lance trudged inside, tracking mud from the battlefield all across the fine carpets. From the looks of the men in the room, he thought that might have been the point.

None of them were wearing armor. He had a thread using [Wyrdic Inspect] on all of them already, but at the end of the day they were officers. They wore fine dress uniforms and carried themselves with practiced dignity, sitting in their nice chairs, tea cups in hand. Some sneered in distaste as the rough fighting men entered, but more wore easy, inviting smiles.

Galan wasn’t in armor either, and wore a dress uniform as well, but the way he wore it made him seem miles apart from the other men.

“Yes! Gurthcid and company. Excellent. Thank you for coming on such short notice.”

Cid saluted. “Sir.”

Galan crossed the room and clapped Cid on both shoulders, uncaring if the act got dirt on his hands. “I apologize in advance for the setting. Normally this is a solemn ceremony, done in front of all present members of the Order, but we don’t currently have the luxury for such things. Over the past few days, I’ve found that if I don’t do something the moment I think of it, it won’t get done at all.”

Brin didn’t like the fact that Galan was running himself ragged like this. He looked as strong as ever, but that was sheer willpower. He should be resting.

“We serve at your command, sir,” said Cid.

“Yes, good.” Galan clapped his shoulders again and then turned to the officers, one hand still on Cid’s shoulder. “I should introduce you. Everyone, this is Gurthcid Trevorrow, a [Knight Captain] and the Prime of one of the finest Lances in my Order. It feels like only yesterday, he was standing in my office telling me of his trepidation at his first command. I’ll admit, he had reason for his feelings. Rather than a Lance of [Knights] and experienced fighting men with exemplary Classes, I gave him nine youths. Five Common Classes, including two crafters and a laborer, the rest low Rares. I hoped he would succeed, but… I tempered my expectations.”

Brin didn’t look left or right, since right now he figured he was supposed to play the role of a perfect [Knight]. With his Invisible Eyes, he noticed Govannon shifting uneasily, so he sent a reminder in everyone’s HUDs that they should be at a perfect parade rest.

“How could I have expected what happened next? The Order of the Long Sleep’s fifty-first Lance did not just excel, they exceeded every possible expectation. A few short weeks later, they defended a town in Prinnash from a goblin horde. Outnumbered ten to one, they defended the people. Alone, they fought a heroic last stand, beating back the enemy and not allowing a single one of the townsfolk to perish.

“Mere days later they were in Canibri. Now outnumbered five hundred to one, they defended the city. Corrupted from within, no soldiers came to guard the walls and the fifty-first Lance fought alone, standing bravely against impossible odds, until inspired by their bravery, the regular citizens took up arms and beat the monsters back.”

One of the less friendly officers, who [Inspected] as Vinic, a level 35 [Warrior Captain], said, “Goblins to the left and right, moving in swarms and threatening cities. And still you say that Lothar–”

“I have said nothing of Lothar. He is a good man, and a good friend, and if he sees danger then I trust he is correct. But we are in Arcaena now,” said Galan, holding up a calming hand.

Lyssa was less polite. “Hold your tongue, you twit. We’re talking about this Lance now. Don’t spoil their moment with Lothar’s mad conspiracies.”

Galan cleared his throat, attempting to get back his steam. “As I was saying, it was an act of extreme heroism, a story you’ve all no doubt heard by now. They further proved themselves in the current action. Always the first on the front, always the quickest to respond to disaster. Unfaltering. Sir Gurthcid Trevorrow, due to your valor, I award your Lance a commendation of bravery. You may now carry this symbol upon your armor.”

He held up a symbol, painted on a square of card paper. Brin didn’t know what it meant, other than that it probably meant “courage.” He’d seen it before, though. Some of the men worked those lines into the designs of their armor. Cid took the paper, and Brin figured he chose his left hand on purpose because it smeared the white paper with drying blood.

“Heroism in battle counts for much, but more can be said for a knight’s conduct in daily life. Does he grow lax during times of safety? Does he neglect his duty and the codes? The fifty-first Lance does not. During a joint exercise to gain trust and cooperation between the Orders, we held a little contest with a focus on discipline and preparation. Despite being ten levels lower on average than a typical Lance, these ten men won that exercise, and by a wide margin. Sir Gurthcid Trevorrow, due to your exacting discipline, I award your Lance a commendation of readiness. You may now carry this symbol upon your armor.”

It was another rune he didn’t know, though he’d seen it on the armor of that Lance from the Order of the Luminous Serpent.

“Well done, men. You’ve made me proud.” Galan went down the line, shaking the hand of each man, clapping them on the shoulders, meeting their eyes, and giving words of encouragement. He even bent down to place his hand on Marksi’s arm. “Don’t forget yourself in this, little one. You had a place in each of these victories, and I expect great things from you.”

Marksi nodded as manfully as any of the [Knights], fully agreeing.

Then, they were dismissed. As soon as they left the tent, there was a palpable sigh of relief. Brin was used to it, but for most, being around that many high-ranking people was stressful. Especially when there was something going on they didn’t totally understand.

Brin wasn’t sure if he totally understood either. Maybe the officers just needed a reminder that there really was a war going on. Just talking about the units like they were pieces on a board might make them think about all of this as a strategy game. Or maybe it was about Lothar? He still wanted them to abandon the war on Arcaena and focus on either the goblins or the Easterlings, and it sounded like some officers in the camp were sympathetic. Brin’s Lance showing up all grimy from war proved the point that even if other dangers were out there, there was a real war going on now.

“Does this mean we’re finally on leave?” asked Brych. “I’m feeling a bit thirsty, if you know what I mean.”

“Two weeks, right? That means fifteen days of drinking!” said Hedrek.

“Hear, hear!” Brych answered, and the rest cheered.

“Not quite yet. We should see Meaty first. He should be able to scratch these symbols into our armor quick enough,” said Cid.

No one really wanted to argue with that. Everyone liked to show off their merits. They quickly made their way across the camps to find Meaty. He agreed to do the work on the spot. For Brin, he asked if he’d want the symbols to be integrated into the design, but Brin didn’t want to wait for lengthy work, so he asked that they just be carved in a blank space like everyone else.

Meaty insisted that the armor be clean, so they all had to settle down and scrub their armor first. Meaty’s work took moments, and then they were all dressing again.

Since Marksi didn’t really have armor, Meaty found a ring that he could use as an armband, and scratched the symbols there.

As soon as Brin put it back on, he got a System message.

[Knightly] has advanced! You have received the following commendations:

Commendation of Valor - You are more intimidating. You move quicker while delivering the first strike in combat.

Commendation of Readiness - You have an increased ability to sense danger. Your armor grows stronger, scaling with Vitality.

Note: Commendations are only applied while wearing armor.

It was one of the most incredible advancements he’d gotten outside of Class-ups. Just like that, just for getting an award. He wasn’t sure if Marksi had gotten the same thing; he didn’t really have the System in the same way that Brin did. But by the excited way the dragonling zipped around after putting his armband on, Brin assumed it did something.

“Now can we get to it?” asked Hedrek.

“Well, yes, but–” Cid looked at Brin.

Brin stepped forward. “I have a request.”

Everyone groaned.

“This really is a request! I’m not asking as your Second. If you don’t want to do it, then you’re free to go off and enjoy leave on your own,” said Brin.

Hedrek took off his helmet so that he could dramatically rub his eyes. “Why do I get the feeling I’m really not going to like this.”

Brin took off his own helmet so he could look everyone in the eyes. “It’s about Sion. I don’t know how he managed it, but he sent us those potions in Canibri and they saved all our lives. Now all his most valuable possessions are trapped under a [Witch’s] curse. There’s also a friend we made there, unburied and rotting in the sun. I want to destroy the curse, repay Sion, and give proper respect to the bodies of the fallen. I want to go to Talra.”