Varna Ch. 14

VARNA Chapter 14

Forty ships. One hundred and fifty cannon, fifty of which would be landed. Twenty-five hundred mercenaries. Two hundred crossbowmen.

How could we fight an army like that?

I needed advice. Yazgash and Enneiros could help, but I also sent for Tir Tanle. I would have called on Dergun as well, but he needed time to set his new lands in order, especially if he was going to bring fighters to join us in the spring.

Beksha and Yavantay had given us one blessing: by selling or bargaining away future titles, they made it highly unlikely that any of the nobles who had supported my brothers would join them. Like us or not, Sanatha and I were by far the better option for them.

But would they bring their men to fight for us? And could we find new sources of manpower? Hundreds of Varnan men - not to mention non-humans - had been killed or seriously wounded. Even if we could raise a large army, we would likely still be outnumbered.

And those guns...

We'd seen cannon in Galtin's Port. They had varieties of guns that we simply couldn't match, for range, accuracy, or weight of shot. I'd avoided presenting our fighters as targets for Merik's guns at Borovo Ridge; could we manage something like that again?

I also needed more information on the mercenaries that they had hired. Were they trained fighters, or merely adventurers and desperate men? Pirates, or veterans with combat experience? And was this Kurebir a cautious man? Kalju had painted him as more of a quartermaster than a battlefield general, but one never knew.

It would be unlikely that they would be bringing many horses, unless it was to drag their cannons about. Or perhaps they would expect to capture horses wherever they landed. I made myself a note to consider stripping Whydah of horses and mules so that the enemy could not acquire them.

I was already resigned to losing our port city again. The seaward defences would not hold against so many ships and guns. To attempt a spirited defence would be to invite our first defeat.

Avoiding defeat was one thing, but how could we win?

We would have several hundred mounted men, unless the Penedas deserted us. What could they achieve? I was counting on Durgat's half-orcs and Alissara's elves, but I would have to employ them wisely. I couldn't leave them exposed to the mercenaries' cannons.

But there were two more things that we had, which they didn't.

Glasha. And me.

***

I went down the river by myself (with Murzosh trailing me, and five more half-orcs within call). My mind was clear - I'd done plenty of thinking.

In the field where Glasha and I had trained, I set to work. I gathered the aether, and let it build within me. Then I gathered more. And more, until I was fit to burst.

I selected a solid looking stone, some fifty yards away.

And I tried to split it, using only the power of my mind.

***

I became aware of a soft, gentle sensation on my face.

My eyes opened, ever so slowly, and focused on a pleasant sight. Glasha. She was stroking my cheek with her fingertips.

- "You frightened us, Tauma." she said, ever so softly. "What were you doing?"

- "Walking the cliff." I said.

That frightened her. That was when I discovered that Saska was on my other side. She'd been sleeping, but she woke up when Glasha spoke.

- "What cliff?" she said. Saska took my hand.

- "I have to travel, for a bit." I said. I turned my head back to Glasha. "I need to see your father - as soon as possible."

I was remarkably lucid, considering that I'd been unconscious for the better part of two days. Murzosh had carried me back to the Palace, and somehow snuck me into our quarters without letting half of Elmina know what had happened.

When I was back on my feet, my bodyguard hovered over me like a nurse.

- "Are you going to do this again?" he asked me.

- "Do what? Magic?"

Murzosh didn't reply to that. He just fixed me with his big, baleful eyes.

- "I can't protect you if you do that." he said.

- "I'm not asking you to."

By the next day, I felt strong enough to go back to the training field. Murzosh was plainly unhappy, but I wasn't prepared for Glasha and Saska.

- "No!" said Glasha.

- "Whatever you're doing," said Saska, "it's too dangerous."

I understood what they were saying. They were concerned - worried about my safety.

- "Glasha - would you ask Sanatha to join us? And Saska - could you call on your mother?"

I gathered my thoughts - and just a little bit of aether.

Then I looked at my family. Four women. It would have been five, had Sirma been old enough. They were all worried about me.

- "I'm the Witch King." I said.

Sanatha's mouth fell open, but Glasha scowled. Saska was most upset.

- "Don't say that!"

- "I've been trying to come up with a strategy to meet the mercenaries." I said. "We're outnumbered, and outgunned. We risked a battle at Borovo, because we were facing Merik. I knew that we could beat him."

- "And we did." said Tir Tanle.

- "But I don't know who will be commanding the mercenaries. Yavantay is the recruiter and paymaster, Kurebir is the organizer and Beksha is the figurehead. But who will be making the decisions? Their cannon will be better than anything we have - how much better? I don't want to send Alissara's and Durgat's people to their deaths."

Saska sniffed.

I looked to her mother.

- "You taught me to look at the enemy's disadvantages, and our advantages. Well... that's what I'm working on."

All four of them loved me, in their own way. I was fairly sure of that. But none of them fully understood what I was saying - except perhaps Glasha.

- "Our enemies call me the Witch King." I said. "Perhaps that's what I need to be. How many advantages do we have? A little mobility, against fifty cannon. Every possibility I see involves massive loss of life on our side."

- "We can't afford to lose you, Tauma." said my wife.

- "But how can I ask our folk to risk their lives, Saska... while I stay protected?"

***

Sanatha didn't like staying in Elmina, but I had to go to Whydah. I took Tir Tanle with me, so that we could talk strategy. Glasha insisted on coming along, obviously so that she could keep an eye on me.

- "Of course you can come." I said. "It'll be your first trip when we're not at war."

We cruised down the river. Tir Tanle and I discussed options, while I scanned the eastern bank, looking for another Borovo.

- "What if they come down the western side?' she said.

- "They won't, for three reasons. First, Beksha will want to pass through his old lands. He knows the area, and he may hope to gather some support. Second, they'll have to feed that huge army. Other than Albo's lands, Azren's and yours, there aren't many places to find supplies on the western approach. The eastern side is wealthier."

- "That's true." she admitted. "And the third reason?"

- "They're afraid of the forest. The deep woods. Or it could just be that they're afraid of the elves and the fey. It's understandable - I was born in Varna, and I still dread the deepest parts of the forests."

- "You haven't mentioned the fey very often, of late." said Tir Tanle.

- "Because I'm not sure if they'll come."

- "They will. You're fighting to defend them as much as any of us. And when they do, how will you use them?"

We were drawing closer to Whydah when it finally struck me. As our boat drifted downstream, I'd been watching a farmer and his family pruning in their apple orchard, on the eastern side of the river.

Whydah. The farms in the east. The fey. And it all began to come together in my mind.

My cousin Bathene - Tir Esin, now - and my friend Hurmas welcomed us. That evening, we met with them, and with Benaz Corig and Captain Urbo. Tir Tanle, Glasha, and Murzosh were with me.

- "How have the repairs been coming along?" I asked.

- "Slowly, but we're making progress." said Bathene. "There were many families who'd lost everything. We had to start with food and shelter, after all the fire damage."

When Nathal and Toran's men and their mercenaries had captured Whydah, almost a fifth of it had burned down. Only a fortunate wind had kept limited the flames to the western end of the city.

"But we've begun repairs on the docks."

- "Unfortunately," I said, "that work has to stop. As of tomorrow."

- "Stop? Why? What do you mean?"

- "Has Captain Urbo told you what's coming?" I'd sent him and Kalju back to Whydah soon after they'd brought me their report.

- "He did." said Hurmas.

- "What he couldn't tell you right away was that we can't defend Whydah." I said.

That silenced them all. They'd spent the past months trying to rebuild their shattered city, and here I was telling them that it had all been in vain.

- "You're abandoning us." said Benaz Corig. "Again." She couldn't help herself.

- "We didn't abandon you." I said. "We came to help you. Late, yes. But we came."

- "You did." said Bathene, sadly. She was re-living unpleasant memories, involving the loss of most of her family: her father, her brother, her aunt, and her husband.

- "We can't defend Whydah." I told them. "The mercenaries will outnumber us, and their advantage in cannon will be overwhelming. But that's not the only problem."

Tir Tanle took over for me. "Even if we could raise 2,000 fighters, and bring them to the city, we simply couldn't find room for them. The walls weren't meant to be defended by so many. Then there's the problem of bringing in enough food to support them."

- "There are many parts of Varna where the full harvest wasn't collected, because of the war. Men were away at harvest time, or the fields were trampled by our armies."

- "Is it that bad?" asked Hurmas.

- "Bad enough. We can't hold Whydah against those guns. Even if we could, I don't think that we could feed the army here. But there's one more reason why I won't fight here: a defeat for us would be catastrophic."

It was a lot for them to swallow, all at once. Captain Urbo was the first to recover.

- "Can you tell us anything of what you intend, my Lord?"

- "Yes. You, Urbo, will get in touch with every ship captain here. They're to take their vessels and cargoes to Portoa. That will have to become their base of operations for the foreseeable future. I understand that it will be difficult for many of them, but the alternative is to be sunk or captured in harbour when the enemy attacks. I don't want a repeat of the first battle of Whydah."

- "You're going to leave the city completely undefended?" said Benaz Corig.

- "Better than that. We're going to evacuate Whydah. Every last person, with everything they can carry. We'll call in all the river boatmen we can gather, to bring away even more of their possessions. When Yavantay and Beksha land, I don't want them to find a single horse, ox, or mule to pull their cannons. We'll take every wagon, and every cart. I don't want them to find any food, or supplies of any kind. Nothing but bare walls and empty houses."

Hurmas, at least, could see the beginnings of my plan.

- "Nothing to plunder, for the mercenaries. They won't be happy."

- "That's right. And it won't just be Whydah. I'll evacuate half of Varna, if I have to."

They were silent again, trying to imagine how I could consider doing that, or what it would look like, if it were even remotely possible.

- "But you intend to fight them, don't you?" said Hurmas.

- "Yes. But I won't stand our people in front of their guns, to let ourselves be bombarded. They may destroy homes, and farms - those we can rebuild. But every step they take into Varna, they'll have to drag their cannon using manpower alone. And they'll get hungry. Urbo must have told you: their expedition is only partly paid for. They've recruited mercenaries on the promise of our lands, and your titles. They don't have money in reserve, to bring in food for 3,000 men, or to buy 500 horses and ship them here. And every step they take, they'll have to worry about us attacking them. We have horsemen - they won't. We have elven archers - their crossbowmen can't match us for range."

- "You'll wear them down." said Urbo, nodding his head.

- "We'll harry them, worry them, and bleed them, like a wolf pack... until we can bring the beast down."

It wasn't quite that easy to win them all over. Bathene and Benaz Corig couldn't even begin to picture driving out all of the inhabitants of their city. But I thought that was far preferable to subjecting them to a second sack of Whydah, which would be more complete and possibly even more savage than the first.

***

We didn't return to Elmina by river. Instead, we rode through the eastern lands, just as we had on the year of our Grand Tour. I was looking at farms, speaking to local landholders, and trying to memorize the locations of advantageous terrain, including the most promising sites for future ambushes.

We made our way to Calep, to speak to our friend Dergun, the new Tir. I'd sent a messenger ahead, asking him to convene Tir Caenog, Gerdar Ostro, and the new Tir Moksha. They listened in stony silence as I outlined the plan I'd formed.

They weren't pleased to hear that they would be asked to evacuate their people and destroy their own crops before the enemy arrived to take them.

- "I have to defend Calep. I can't forsake my people." said Dergun.

I was disappointed. Of all of them, I'd hoped that he would see what I was hoping to achieve. Was it the newness of his title that was affecting his thinking?

- "If they get this far, Dergun, they'll have fifty cannon - more modern, and more deadly by far than anything we have. There'll be no stopping them."

- "Why can't we stop them at Whydah?" asked Tir Moksha. "Then they would never get here at all."

I let Tir Tanle answer that question. She outlined all of the reasons why we couldn't hope to successfully defend the port city.

The new Tir Moksha was a surprisingly reasonable young man. When Tir Tanle reminded him that the invaders were after his title as well as his lands, he began to come over to our way of thinking.

So did Dergun, eventually.

- "I'm sorry, Lord. It would break my heart to abandon Calep. But... I'll do it, if it's necessary."

- "Save the people, Dergun. Houses and gardens can be rebuilt. If it comes to it, I'll pack up my brother's books, and burn Elmina before I let the mercenaries have it."

- "I believe you, Lord."

We could have asked Durgat to come to Calep. But I wanted to do him the honour of visiting him at the Blasted Tree. He deserved it, after what he and his people had done for Sanatha and me.

I also wanted Glasha to have the opportunity to see it. She was part orc, too - or part half-orc, at least.

Durgat gathered over 200 of his warriors, and invited me to address them. I stood beneath their Blasted Tree, and told them some harsh truths.

- "We won't stop them at Whydah." I said. "We may not be able to stop them before Calep - and if they come that far, they may come here, looking for plunder, or simply to exact vengeance on you for opposing them. You may have to abandon your homes, and hide away the oldest and youngest of your folk. It grieves me that I may not be able to protect this tree. But I will be busy, trying my best to kill those who threaten you."

That was met with a cheer. I wasn't to know it until later, but I was the first Duke of Varna to visit the Blasted Tree since Arivan Cunedda, the founder of our dynasty. The half-orcs, though, were all aware of that bit of history. They took my arrival as the final proof that I would fight for them. They'd fought for us at Whydah and Borovo; now they were certain that I would fight for them as well.

Glasha and I were given a small, but rather comfortable cave to sleep in. We made love there, while the Red Knees were still celebrating outside.

***

We rode back towards Elmina. I was still examining farms, meeting briefly with local landholders. I didn't expect the coming war to reach this far; if it did, then my strategy would be well on its way to failing.

One night, I slipped away from the others, and tried once again to stretch my boundaries. I aimed an aether spear at a tree, from a distance of one hundred paces.

I hit it, and split the tree. I also knocked myself unconscious. Murzosh and Glasha found me the next morning. They were none too pleased, because I'd told him that I would be with her, and that we would appreciate some privacy.

I shouldn't have played with them like that. They were terrified when they couldn't wake me for three days. Also, I couldn't conceal the fact that when I did wake, I was suffering from a terrible headache. My vision was blurry, too.

- "Tauma, please..." said Glasha.

- "I'll be more careful." I promised.

When we reached Elmina, a small council was waiting for me. I'd summoned Tir Peneda's designated heir, Arvo, Tir Alit (who brought his son), Sezima's successor, and two other southern Gerdars.

- "Your lands are probably safe." I told them. "If we win. But every other lord in Varna will be risking their lands as well as their titles. They will need your help. Armed men, and mounted men - but food as well."

I also spent several days visiting every fletcher in Elmina. We needed arrows - thousands of arrows. I commissioned every workshop possible to make arrows.

But I had other important business. Sanatha needed to know what I'd done at Whydah, and in the east. Saska had missed me, and she was especially worried when Glasha told her the truth about my magical experiments.

Most of all, though, I needed to see Glasha's father, who had acceded to my request, and come to Elmina.

- "I'm walking the cliff, Rhigen." I said. "I need your help."

***

I had to push myself, to stretch my limits, and to find a way to influence the war with my magic. Rhigen had warned me not to go too far, but I had many questions that only he could answer.

- "You must be more careful, Lord." he said.

- "Lord?" I said. "Am I your Duke, or your Varyan?"

He didn't answer me - which was answer enough.

"Tell me this, Rhigen: did you know that Glasha would be able to do magic? That she would be able to time-walk?"

- "No, Lord. I... I hoped that she would. But it is never guaranteed, even when both parents have the talent. When it is only one..."

- "It's even rarer?"

- "Yes."

- "What about when neither parent is talented?"

Rhigen looked down, and let out a long, slow breath through his nose.

- "It is... very uncertain."

- "Rare, you mean."

- "Yes, Lord."

- "So tell me, Rhigen: why do I have talent? And why have my sister and my dead brother Nathal shown considerable talent as well?"

- "It's..."

- "I understand that you can lie or withhold information from the Duke of Varna. But can you do the same to the Varyan?"

Rhigen surprised me by going down on one knee. He didn't raise his head, though, so he still wasn't meeting my eyes.

- "No, Lord." he said. "I will explain. Do you know the parentage of Arivan Cunedda? Your forefather?"

- "Of course I don't. He was the founder of our dynasty, and his origins are buried in the mists of time, and all of that garbage."

- "Arivan Cunedda's father was human. His mother was fey."

- "What?"

- "The founder of your line had talent. He was untrained, of course, but we believe that he was at least partly proficient in mind magic."

- "Wait - you believe he was?"

Rhigen finally lifted his head, and looked at me.

- "I met Arivan Cunedda. Naevys knew him. For a time, we thought he might be the Varyan."

I had fey blood? Arivan Cunedda was half fey? I was going to have to re-write all of the chronicles. No - it hadn't escaped my notice that Glasha's father was claiming to be over 200 years old.