L. Modesitt - Imager’s Battalion

“I didn’t have a chance to read through the dispatch and orders from Marshal Deucalon. I’d received them just before breakfast.” Skarpa shook his head. “He sent ten pages of instructions and cautions.” Then he motioned to a circular table in the middle of the room. Once the three were seated, he continued. “They’re barely past a point opposite Roule. I don’t know what’s taking them so long, because they haven’t fought anything much. Just a few companies here and there, but they’ve been trying to stop crop-burning. That can take time, according to Deucalon, because he doesn’t have imagers.”

Quaeryt didn’t hide the wince.

“You disagree, Subcommander?”

“The troopers did more than the imagers to stop the burning we encountered. Imagers can’t do everything he thinks they can.”

“I don’t think I’ll mention that to the marshal. They’re also having problems getting supplies. Apparently, there aren’t that many large factors or High Holders near the river on the north side, and most of the factors already sold their stores to the Bovarian forces who attacked Ferravyl. That means we’re supposed to stay here until we get further word. We’re also to report our supply situation in the next few days.”

Skarpa turned to Quaeryt. “Didn’t you tell me your imagers can remove locks?”

“If the iron of the hasps isn’t too thick,” replied Quaeryt cautiously.

“Good. We’ve got all these warehouses along the river, and some of them might have supplies we can use. No one seems to know where the owners are.” Skarpa snorted. “I’d rather not break down the doors because then we can’t secure them. I’ll have a squad of quartermasters ready for you after we finish, and you and your imagers can open the warehouses.”

“I’d thought to visit the nearest High Holder, to see about supplies there as well.”

“Let’s see what we’ve got here in town first.”

Quaeryt nodded.

“Here are our instructions, and I’ve been told to read the first part word for word to you two.” Skarpa smiled. “It appears that Marshal Deucalon is aware that you both have creative ways of interpreting general orders.”

Meinyt did not roll his eyes, but he might as well have, given the brief expression that crossed his face.

Skarpa ignored it and cleared his throat. “‘The mission of this campaign is to bring Bovaria into a union with Telaryn. The mission is not to ravage, pillage, or otherwise destroy the lands, the buildings, or the people of these lands, except when and where they offer armed resistance. Force against those not wearing the uniforms of either Bovaria or Antiago should be used only as a last resort, and such use should be appropriate to the situation at hand…’”

Reading the remaining three pages of “instructions” took another quint, most of it wasted, Quaeryt thought, since the message was what he’d already told his officers and men.

After that, Quaeryt and the imager undercaptains followed the quartermaster squad to the warehouses. The two warehouses belonging to Haeryn were locked-and empty. So was the one belonging to the river factors’ guild. A smaller warehouse, belonging to a factor from Nordeau, held not quite a hundred barrels of flour, dried meats, and some dried fruit.

By the time Quaeryt and the imagers finished with the locks at the four warehouses on the river, it was close to two quints before the first glass of the afternoon. Another quint passed before Quaeryt rode out along the road west of Caernyn accompanied by Shaelyt, Akoryt, Baelthm … and Major Arion and fourth company.

“This High Holder … he will not be at his holding,” offered Arion in accented Bovarian.

“It’s likely he won’t be,” agreed Quaeryt.

“Then will you take what we need for supplies?”

“We will have to see,” replied Quaeryt. “It might be that there is nothing to purchase or take. I can’t imagine he has vast lands, or that they produce much.”

“The High Holders of Bovaria always have much.”

“True … but the battalion can’t eat golds or silvers.”

At the dryness of Quaeryt’s tone, Arion laughed.

Before that long, the battalion reined up short of the pair of stone pillars that marked the entrance to Haeryn’s holding. Each pillar supported an iron gate, chained shut in the middle. A stone wall, less than two yards high, ran some fifteen yards from each gate pillar, parallel to the road, ending just short of a hedgerow.

Quaeryt turned in the saddle. “Akoryt, if you’d come forward and image away the hasp of that ugly lock…”

“Yes, sir.”

Quaeryt thought he saw a flash of … something … in the undercaptain’s normally flat brown eyes, but he just watched as Akoryt eased his mount to a halt just short of the gates. After several moments, while the undercaptain concentrated, the body of the lock dropped away from the hasp.

“Are we to replace the lock once we leave, sir?”

“That would be best,” replied Quaeryt.

Akoryt dismounted and lifted the hasp clear of the chains, then unwound the chains and picked up the lower part of the lock. By the time he’d finished, two Khellan rankers had dismounted and began to open the gates.

“Forward!” ordered Quaeryt.

The outriders led the way along the white gravel drive running straight from the gates to the columned portico in the center of the white stone structure that dominated a low rise surrounded on all sides by lawns and gardens. When Quaeryt reached the portico, less than half a mille from the gates, he could see that every window was shuttered. Two decorative iron outer doors were locked across the entry to the hold house whose two wings each stretched some fifty yards from the center of the building, not quite a miniature palace, but far more than a mere mansion.

Quaeryt hadn’t seen any recent tracks on the drive, and the stone steps up to the covered portico were dusty and without any trace of footprints. While he suspected the outbuildings would be locked-and empty, based on what they had found in Caernyn, he turned the mare and led the company along the drive on the west side of the hold house. Every building was locked and shuttered, even the stable, and the two other dwellings on the property were also locked and shuttered.

The almost-eroded deep ruts outside the structure that looked to be a storehouse suggested that it had been emptied weeks earlier. Even so, Quaeryt had Baelthm sever the storehouse lock, but a search of the building revealed only a few barrels of odd provisions-pickles, and several spoiled-from the odor-barrels of dried fruit.

Investigation of the other buildings and the hold house confirmed that there were no supplies to be had anywhere on the holding.

While Shaelyt repaired the lock on the main door of the hold house, Quaeryt considered. The next nearest High Holder was Fauxyn, reputedly ten milles farther west along the river. Quaeryt thought about heading out directly from Haeryn’s holding, then shook his head. Fauxyn’s lands lay far enough away that he needed to discuss that with Skarpa, especially since he had no idea what the scouts might have discovered, and it would be close to dark, if not later, before they returned to Caernyn.

“We’ll head back to town,” he announced to Arion and the undercaptains.

Once they were on the road, after Akoryt repaired the lock on the main gate, Arion looked from his mount to Quaeryt. “You did not wish to inspect the main house with greater care? There might have been much of value there.”

“Lord Bhayar would prefer the allegiance of the High Holders, rather than their enmity,” replied Quaeryt. “Also, if you destroy all they have, you lose leverage. A holder who has much to lose is much more easily persuaded. Besides, we saw nothing of obvious great value. I imagine such items had already been removed.”