Breaking an Empire (4 page)

Llof lifted the recruit to his shoulder, and they continued to the camp, resting away the day. Locsyn disappeared to retrieve news of the field, returning when he had enough juicy morsels. “Fairly simple day of combat, all told. Lianese charged our centre, and didn’t have enough skirmishers to prevent us curling around and cracking them like a nut. They’ve fled in poor array to Miath Mhor, and we’ve got chasers after them. Won’t catch too many, but enough to harass the bastards until they get back to the city.”

“Not looking forward to that.” Rhy answered. “Miath Mhor isn’t fortified, which is good news for us… kind of. We’re going to have to go in and fight street by street, building by building, if we want to capture it. Perfect for ambushes, bleeding our superior numbers in tiny fights.”

The other soldiers looked perturbed, and Rhocas went pale. Llof rose, tossing a comment over his shoulder. “Burn the city. No more ambushes.” He then disappeared into the dark night. With that grim thought dancing in their heads, the other five soldiers fell to arguing the merits.

“We’d survive the battle with more men, and hurt Niam Liad besides.”

“And all the supplies, the food, the wealth. You want to throw that away?”

“Dead men eat no food, spend no coin. I want to stay alive as long as I can, and dying in a city engagement isn’t going to help that. No, we burn the Lianese and let them starve. We’ve got enough supplies, and foraging to add to them. Break them at this city and we’ve got them for the rest of the campaign, too scared to fight.”

“And if it makes the Lianese too angry to flee, to surrender? Then we fight against the desperate, for they will trade life for life until annihilation, and here they have more lives. Bloody streets are better than burned ones.”

The argument raged into the night, until Rhyfelwyr gestured for them to go to bed. Rhocas had passed out long ago, the pain in his wound deadened by the herbs. Gwyth rolled over and fell asleep, unmindful of the cuts he had taken. The others followed suit, although Llofruddiwr had not returned. He was a dark one, but the best fighter Rhy had ever seen, and so was permitted his quirks.

***

Trumpets called to meet the dawn. Groggy and mealy-mouthed, the soldiers of Glanhaol Fflamboethi stretched themselves, veterans all this day. To the sound of burning logs and popping joints, a warm breakfast was served, and the army gathered itself into march formation, outriders spread wide. There was no fear of an ambush, only precautions against the unlikely possibility of one.

In the eyes of soldiers who had fought but once, this was to be an easy campaign, where the enemy would flee and the cities crumble in surrender. Older heads worried, for it was an ill sign to them that the campaign had begun easily. They preferred difficulty, even disaster, in the first battle, for from them on, the situation could only improve. Not this. This meant a stiffening of the spine, a reorganization, a building antipathy, and so the veterans feared Miath Mhor, and all that it meant.

On the morning of the third day from battle, the army paused on a ridge overlooking the city they had come to reclaim. The officers gathered on the highest point and discussed the strategy to be used in taking this bastion of Lianese strength. Some spoke in favour of soldiers, others for torches. The conference mirrored that of Rhyfelwyr and his squad, but these men came to a conclusion, and so it was the skirmishers of Bhreac Veryan bound rags to their javelins and brought forth burning brands. Ringing the city, they charged, shields held high to ward away arrows fired from the outlying buildings. Dashing through the streets at a full run, torch after torch sailed into warehouses, apartment towers, mansions, hovels, any building that looked as if it might burn.

Miath Mhor was a city made of wood, and as the skirmishers fled the burning in ragged numbers, the rest of Glanhaol Fflamboethi could see the flames licking higher. Soon the fires became an inferno that swallowed Miath Mhor, devouring the heart of the people within. Citizens fled and the Veryan army let them go, their hungry mouths a burden on the Lianese. Men who looked like soldiers, or even of fighting age, were cut down by battalions positioned about the city. Others fled into the fishing boats, and white sails filled the harbour as they sought to flee the sparks and the smoke. In their haste, many ran aground or crashed, and wrecks filled the harbour. It was a day of carnage for the Lianese, their city destroyed, their livelihoods stolen, their families broken.

The Veryan soldiers had taken losses, more than the commander had hoped, but a paltry few compared to the brutality of street combat. And so after witnessing the destruction of Miath Mhor, the path of the war turned the army south, their next goal the city of Horaim, the last major point of defence before Niam Liad itself.

It was smiling soldiers who led the way, striding down the road towards glory and spoils.

***

Two days later, those smiles disappeared as Glanhaol Fflamboethi passed burnt farmsteads and fields of scorched grain, the legacy of the Lianese retreat to the south. Rhyfelwyr looked at Taflen, his eyes full of questions. “It promises annihilation to their own, doesn’t it?”

Taflen nodded. “There will be little food this winter, aside from what the few fishing boats left will bring. No grains, no vegetables, no meat. Their commander must despise us to a degree we have not yet seen. I wonder if our burning of Miath Mhor was a cause of this scorching?”

Llof joined the two soldiers. “No, it wasn’t. This was planned before we arrived, as a fall-back measure. Wait till we get south.” With that, he wandered off.

“Does he always have to do that? It’s annoying, being the educated one and having him run rings around me.” Taflen muttered.

Rhyfelwyr grunted. “You’re still not used to that? Llofruddiwr has usually figured out what the enemy is going to do before they’ve done it. Why do you think I have him around? Keeps our necks safe.”

With a miserable look, Taflen stomped away, his back straight, muttering about soldiers who don’t know their place in life.

“What’s got into him?” Gwyth and Locsyn joined their sergeant on the small mound where he was stationed as a picket.

“Oh, he got outsmarted by Llofruddiwr again.” Rhyfelwyr chuckled.

“Still stings him, does it? It’s been going on for years, you’d think he’d learn by now.”

“He’s a teacher, not a learner.”

“True. So why are you up here, Rhy? We could all stick our heads in the sand and no one would attack us.”

“Buggered if I know, Loc. Officer’s orders. Keeping the camp in shape, I suppose. Means I sit up here and watch the smoke rising from the land. Not exactly what I want to see.”

“Burning more farms, are they?”

“East, west, south. There’s a damn ring of smoke curling up around us. The Lianese are sending patrols to the sides of our route to make sure that burns too. I know we’re the Cleansing Flame, but even fire need to eat. Keep this up and it’ll be starving.”

“I think that’s what they want, Rhy.” Locsyn twisted one end of his moustache. “After that first battle, they know they’re going to have a hard time beating us in open combat, so why bother? Doing this, and then slamming us hard when we’re weak and sick down by Horaim, well… it might work. Soldiers don’t fight well on empty stomachs. I hate to think it, but they might have come up with a way to defeat us.”

Gwyth responded. “What about our mages? They can control fire, right? So why not have them put out the flames?”

“It’d be too much work for them, and they’d be exhausted when it came to fighting. They’re the best thing we’ve got going for us. The Lianese mages are all sailors and lazy, fat types, used to sitting around wondering what sauce the chef is going to put on the fish. Ours are combat trained from youth. It’s why we haven’t seen many airmages in the field; they’re mostly useless. Good thing, too. They’ve already got enough arrows and javelins and other crap to throw at us, they don’t need more.”

“So we keep pushing on and hope for the best? You aren’t making me amazed at your leadership, Rhy.” This was Locsyn, his face downcast.

“You got a better idea, tell those officers over there. I’m sure they’d love to hear it.”

“Hit the Lianese and take their food. It’s worked before.”

“We’re trying that, Gwyth. Already did it once, even. We just decided to burn all of the food instead of take it. Think we outsmarted ourselves on that one. Wonder if the Lianese were willing to let Miath Mhor burn in order to defeat us later. Gods that would be cruel to their own if they did.”

“Think the ones running the rebellion are having it hard? I bet the peasants in the fields are getting squeezed, and the commanders and the money boys are hanging around in the back, living their comfortable life and trading away with Bohortha Eilan like nothing is changed at all.” Locsyn glowered.

“Soldier’s lot in life, being screwed by people higher up. Nothing new there for any of us. Probably have more in common with the poor sots we’re stabbing in the gut than with the people giving us the orders.” Gwyth nodded at a distant officer.

“You’re a soldier, ain’t you? Good, now stop bitching and go back to camp. Get yourself all polished up and ready, cause when I get down from this picket, you’re on inspection.”

“I was just saying…”

“Shut it, Gwyth. Inspection, got me?”

“Yeah, yeah, got you.”

Locsyn and Gwyth headed back into camp, leaving Rhyfelwyr alone with his thoughts.

The sun was low over the horizon, lending a red back-light to the fires and smoke that consumed the land. If veterans like Locsyn were wondering why the army was here, rot was spreading faster than Rhy had thought possible. Amazing how quickly passion disappears when the stomach knows it’s going empty.

***

For a solid week since the army’s crushing victory at Miath Mhor, they had seen no sign of enemy forces, only burnt farmhouses and fields empty of grain. A few had been harvested in haste and their supplies pulled south, but most had been torched, the food they had promised now ashes scattered on the ground.

There was dissent amongst the ranks, for the army had been put on half-rations to conserve food. Glanhaol Fflamboethi had also split, travelling in three columns down the peninsula. The two outside columns had peeled away to take up station twenty miles either side of the main march. It was far enough apart that should any meet the full strength of Niam Liad in battle, it could go rough, but that was a risk the commanders were willing to take in order to widen the search for food. The hope was the Lianese could not burn such a large swathe. Or perhaps the Veryan soldiers could drive off the Lianese before the burnings had taken place.

The wings were to reform two days march outside of Horaim, and would then invest the city. With the food stocks as low as they were, the assault on Horaim would have to commence within a few days of the Veryan arrival, although the threat of raids from the Lianese defenders worried the officers of Glanhaol Fflamboethi; responding to each raid would sap the energy of their troops. All in all, the campaign had taken a decided turn for the worse.

Rhyfelwyr and his squad marched in the vanguard of the central army, leading the thrust down the peninsula. The sergeant would rather have been with one of the outlying armies, for they had a better chance of finding fresh food. Oh, the stocks weren’t as low as rumoured, but eating pressed meat and trail bread day after day was not a diet the stomach could readily enjoy.

There had been a bit of good luck the night past, for they had come on a farmstead where the basement had been stuffed full of goods and grains, stored away against a famine. The Lianese must have torched the building and the land around it without checking inside. The Veryan soldiers had cheered when extra rations were handed out that night. The men went to sleep with full stomachs, and woke up contented with their lot in life.

***

The army marched down a road that wound between fields of crops, their ashes tossed by the winds. It was a sight to sour the mind, and Rhyfelwyr saw those around him become bitter, especially Rhocas, who had not the years of experience to build barriers about the mind. The sergeant hoped there was a battle soon, for it could snap the young man back to himself, rather than his new silent and morose temperament.

Locsyn sidled up to Rhyfelwyr and tapped him on the shoulder. “So what do we do? That kind of attitude’s poison in an army. Everyone sees it and it infects the rest. Granted, he’s not the only one, but every time a soldier looks to the vanguard, they see slump-shoulders over there leading the way, looking like someone kicked his puppy.”

“I know, I know, but how do I cheer him up? He looks at me and nods whenever I speak to him, and then goes on being the old mope. And I can’t exercise him, because there isn’t enough food for that.”

“Maybe get us sent on one of the foraging parties? We should be one of the squads next in line anyhow, and it might provide enough of a change to break that ugly clay he’s baked over himself.”

“That’s not the worst idea you’ve ever had Loc. Not that that’s saying much. Right, I’ll go talk to an officer or two, see what they can do for us.”

Two days later, their turn came, and Rhyfelwyr put Llofruddiwr on point. The man was a ghost, and could find danger before it found them. The other five followed at a distance, with Locsyn having the unenviable job of being the rearguard. The squad’s patrol area was to the western side of the army, between this branch and the next, and so with the rising of the sun, Llofruddiwr turned his back on the glowing orb and headed off.

The march took them across a ruined landscape. The first few plantations had been picked clean, and so the patrol had a ten mile march to reach their assigned area. The hike saw them pass the shells of farmhouses, the remains of barns, the carcasses of work animals left to rot and die, and fields that had been turned into ruined husks.

“This devastation is unprecedented. I have never, in all my years, heard of a war conducted in such a self-destructive manner. Why, even if they win, the Lianese will be set back a generation, if not longer.” Taflen gaped at the terrain.