The Crimson Campaign

Tamas felt a sliver of ice creep down his spine despite the heat. A flash of memory, and once again he was standing beside a shallow grave, dug with bare hands in the cold of night beside the torrent of a raging river. The end of a daring — but ultimately failed — plan, and the most harrowing escape of Tamas’s long career.

Gavril tugged at the front of his sweat-soaked vest. “We’ll be going right by. I’m going to stop and pay my respects.”

“I don’t think I could find him,” Tamas said, though he knew it was a lie. The location of the grave was burned into his memory.

“I can,” Gavril said.

“It’s quite a ways off the road. If I remember right.”

“You’ll stop too.”

Tamas looked back at his column of soldiers again. They marched on, the dust rising above them carried into the sky by a light breeze.

“I have men on the march, Jakola,” he said. “I’m not stopping for anything.”

Gavril sniffed. “It’s ‘Gavril’ now, and yes, you will be stopping.” He went on, not giving Tamas the chance to object. “You can lose the Kez entirely at the Fingers. We just have to reach the first bridge before them.”

The Fingers of Kresimir were a series of deep, powerful snow-fed rivers off the Adran Mountains. They were impossible to ford, even on horseback. The Great Northern Road traversed them by a series of bridges built almost a hundred years ago.

“If we can reach the bridge before them,” Tamas said, thankful to leave the topic of that lonely grave behind. “Even if we do, the cavalry can go west and around and be waiting for us when we come down onto the plains.”

“You’ll think of something.”

Tamas ground his teeth together. He had eleven thousand infantry and two hundred cavalry, and just a four-day lead on a group of Kez cavalry that could very well equal his numbers. Dragoons and cuirassiers had more than just an edge on infantry in open battle.

“We need food,” Tamas said.

Gavril looked toward the west and the tantalizing wheat fields of the Amber Expanse. “If we slow down too much to forage, the cavalry will reach us before Hune Dora Forest. Once we reach the forest, there are few farms. Foragers might bag deer and rabbits, but not enough to go around.”

“And the city itself?”

Tamas remembered there was a settlement just south of Hune Dora Forest. Whether the forest took its name from the settlement, or the other way around, Tamas did not know.

“It’s generous calling it a ‘city.’ It has walls, sure, but there can’t be more than a few hundred people. We might be able to buy or steal enough food for a day or two.” Gavril paused. “I hope you’re not planning on stripping the countryside of everything. The people here have it hard enough. Ipille treats his serfs worse than Manhouch ever did.”

“An army needs food, Jak… Gavril.”

Tamas stared toward the mountains, barely noticing the white peaks. He had to balance this army perfectly. They needed food and safety. If they reached Hune Dora Forest without food, his men would begin to starve and desert. If they took too long to forage, the cavalry would reach them before the forest and have their way with the entire column.

Olem returned from his task, cantering up beside Tamas and Gavril.

“Olem,” Tamas said. “Signal the column to stop.” He paused to examine the countryside. To the left of the road an overgrown field sloped down toward a ravine a half mile off. “This here, it’ll do.”

“For what, sir?”

Tamas steeled himself. “It’s time I talk to the men. Assemble them in ranks.”

It took nearly an hour for the last of the columns to catch up. It was valuable time lost, but thus far Tamas had left the officers to tend to their men and keep them informed. If he was going to keep command of this lot — retain their discipline and loyalty over the next few weeks — he needed to speak to them himself.

He stood on the edge of the road and looked down the slope. The field had been trampled, the green replaced by Adran blue, standing at ease in ranks like so many blades of grass.

Tamas knew that many of these men would die without reaching their homes.

“’Tention!” Olem bellowed.

There was an audible shifting of legs and straightening of backs as eleven thousand soldiers snapped to attention.

The world was silent. A breeze picked up, blowing down from the mountains and pushing gently on Tamas’s back. To their credit, not a single soldier reached to steady his hat.

“Soldiers of the Seventh and Ninth,” he began, shouting to be heard by all. “You know what’s happened. You know that Budwiel has fallen and that the Kez push in to Adro, checked only by the Adran army.

“I grieve for Budwiel. I know that you grieve with me. Many of you question why we didn’t stay and fight.” Tamas paused. “We were outnumbered and outclassed. The fall of Budwiel’s walls made our initial strategy obsolete and we could not have won that battle. As you all know, I do not fight battles that I will not win.”

There was a murmur of agreement. The anger at abandoning Budwiel had dulled in the six days since. The men understood. There was no need to dwell on it further.