L. Modesitt - Mage-Guard of Hamor

"How would you have handled the situation coming into Lahenta, then, ser?" asked Rahl.

"I would have scouted much farther ahead when it became apparent that the road was rising into a pass. Narrow passes where the defender holds the high ground are always harder on whoever has to attack uphill or defend from an uphill attack. If you had drawn up Third Company short of their entrapment, then they would have been faced with attacking you on a narrow road on level ground. Your superior mage-craft would have worked to your advantage because they would not have been able to surround you. You still could have used the same tactic with the chaos-ooze, but they would have had to cross it to attack you, and you could not have been attacked from behind."

Taryl made it sound so easy.

"Now… I admit that it's not always that easy, but you're very bright, Rahl. You need to think in those terms. You need to ask how many ways could the rebels attack you at every point of your patrols and how you could best respond to each attack. If such an attack might inflict heavy losses, then you need to think of a better way to approach-or make very sure that there are no enemy forces anywhere close before you employ massive magery."

"Yes, ser."

Taryl smiled, almost fatherly. "It may seem as though I'm being hard on you, but I'm trying to get you to expand your thinking and the way in which you use your brains and your abilities because matters are going to get worse before they get better."

Rahl understood that, but he still felt that Taryl had no idea what it had been like.

"One other thing, Rahl, before we get into what you'll be doing tomorrow…"

"Yes, ser?"

"Find yourself a staff or something longer than that patrol truncheon. I shouldn't have to tell you this. If you keep overusing your order-abilities, you're going to need it." After the briefest of pauses, Taryl went on. "Now… tomorrow, I'll need you to see if you can pinpoint where those rebel troops are or at least from where they're coming…"

Rahl sat and listened intently as the overcommander explained in detail what he wanted. At the back of his mind, he still wondered why Taryl had referred to Deybri. Was it just to get through to him?

He forced his concentration back onto Taryl's words.

Early on threeday, just after dawn, Rahl took out the glass once more and tried to scree exactly where the nearest rebel troopers might be. All he could determine before his head began to pound and the light-headedness threatened to overwhelm him was that close to a battalion of heavy infantry was encamped in a small hamlet surrounded by grasslands in a flat area where the grass remained green.

While he and Drakeyt sat on a bundle of hay and ate rations and strips of left-over lamb, Rahl studied Drakeyt's maps to see if he could determine where the rebels might be. Following Taryl's implied advice about assuming the worst about the enemy's tactics and position, he thought that they might be about five kays south from Thalye, just south of where a line of hills had been sketched in on the map. Supposedly, there was a stretch of grassland beyond Thalye that separated the less populated inland parts of Merowey from the richer lands along the coast.

"I'd judge they're here." Rahl pointed. "I'm not sure, but that's where it feels like."

"It'd make sense, but that worries me because nothing's made much sense so far." Drakeyt grinned.

"It still doesn't," Rahl said. "They've only got a battalion there, and the ground is pretty open, not like that pass coming into Lahenta."

"Maybe they're just trying to block Third Company. Three companies didn't stop us; so now they're trying five."

Rahl still didn't like what he'd screed, and he could sense that Drakeyt didn't either. But he didn't know what else he could do but carry out Taryl's orders. He didn't see much point in tracking down Taryl just to report that he had a slightly better idea of where the rebels were, since he was partly guessing, anyway. The important thing was that Taryl knew about where they were and that they were headed toward Second Army.

Rahl stood, carefully folding the maps and handing them back to the captain. "I need to see the cooper before we head out. I'm hoping she can make me a replacement truncheon or something like it. I should have thought about that earlier."

Drakeyt nodded. "There's always something. About the time you learn what you're doing, they promote you or transfer you, and you start all over." He paused. "Then again, if you don't learn, you get relieved or killed."

"You're so cheerful," Rahl said dryly.

"Just realistic, Majer."

Rahl saddled the gelding, then mounted. He rode northward toward the square with a damp wind at his back, under thick clouds that suggested rain. Rahl could order-sense that any rain that might fall would be light and would likely not last long. When he reached the square and the chandlery/cooperage, he reined up and dismounted, tied the gelding to the ancient wooden railing, and stepped up onto the narrow porch. He only knocked on the cooperage door once before Khelra opened it, holding it ajar.

"Yes, Majer?"

"I'd like to commission something from you, if you can do it."

"You want some sort of barrel?"

"No. I'd like a wooden truncheon, a sort of staff with a hilt, a little longer than a sabre." Rahl gestured to the empty scabbard at his belt. He'd left the patrol truncheon in his saddlebags. "One that would fit in here."

"Out of oak or something sturdy?"

"Lorken would be best, dark oak next, oak after that."

"Come on in. You need to sketch out what you want. We'll see if it's possible. Then we'll talk coins." Khelra walked away from the door through the dim and unlit single room toward the cooper's workbench against the south wall. "When do you need it?"

"By tonight, or tomorrow morning at the latest." Rahl followed her.

"That figures." She stopped at the bench. "What happened to the one you had?"

"It got destroyed in a fight with a white wizard."

Khelra just nodded. Behind the expression, there was little surprise, as if fighting with a white wizard were the most normal thing in the world. "That why you don't you use a blade like the others?"

Rahl shook his head. "I can't. I'm an ordermage. I know how to handle a blade, but using it for long would make me unable to do much of anything."

"All ordermages like that?"

"Some can't even pick up a blade without getting sick," Rahl said.

"So you just kill them with magery and use your big stick to hold off attackers?"

Rahl smiled, sadly, before he replied, but he saw no point in lying. "No. I've killed men both ways. It's just a different kind of weapon."

"Leastwise you're honest about it." She handed him a piece of charcoal. "Rough it out on the board here."

"Can you use those barrel hoops to bind it below the hilt and at the striking end?"

"I can. Won't be as strong as forged iron."

"It'll be stronger than unbound wood."

She nodded, then watched as Rahl loosened the scabbard from his belt, setting it on the wood and using it as a rough guide as he sketched the truncheon he had in mind.

"Good hand. Could have been an artist."

"I was a scrivener once."

"They still have those?"

"In places." Rahl finished the sketch. "This is a guide. You know woods better than I ever will. Just do your best and make it so it will fit in the scabbard."

"Might have some old oak that would do. More work that way."

"How much?"

"Be at least two silvers."

"I can afford that. Can you crosshatch the hilt or something to give a better grip?"

The cooper smiled. "I'll find a way."

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me, Majer. You're paying good silvers for it."