Robert Newcomb - Rise of the Blood Royal

Lucius nodded. “Even so, it grows by the moment! The gold deposits are staggering in their abundance! It seems that no matter how much we take, more always lies beneath, ripe for the picking!”

Vespasian opened the diptych and he ran his eyes down the single page. As expected, the report was in Gracchus’ handwriting. Even the emperor was stunned by what it said.

The amount of gold already sent home to Ellistium was greater than the largest amount that had ever existed in her treasury. At this rate, in mere days the empire’s coffers would hold a nearly incomprehensible amount. Vespasian smiled as he realized that the Rustannican imperial mint would be stamping new coins for decades or longer, and that each coin would bear his likeness.

Despite the encouraging tally, as Vespasian looked around the valley again his expression saddened. Unable to understand why, Persephone gave her husband a questioning look.

“What troubles you, my love?” she asked. “In only a few more days we will have sent more gold home than we could ever have imagined! Who knew that it would be so easily harvested? Your campaign is a towering success!”

“Perhaps,” he answered. “Even so, our problems have not ended.” Vespasian shook his head.

“It’s thisplace, Persephone,” he said quietly. “We must tarry here because the gold lies here. But as a military stronghold, this valley is a nightmare. We must soon decide how long to stay and loot the fields, because every moment that passes brings us that much closer to engaging the Shashidans. If they somehow close off both ends of the valley-”

“A necessary gamble, my liege,” Lucius said. “We have legions posted at both the northern and southern valley entrances. At the first sign of the Shashidans, our forces will engage them, and they will personally inform us by way of one of the azure portals. You may put your entire trust in them. They have never failed us.”

“I know, I know,” Vespasian answered, rubbing his brow. His heart was filled with a strange blend of euphoria and impending doom, and the conflicting emotions showed on his face. “It’s not a matter of whether the Shashidans come, but when. They’ll divide their forces, then try to seal off both ends of the valley, I’m sure of it.”

“How can you be so certain?” Persephone asked.

“Because that’s what I would do,” Vespasian answered grimly. “A schoolchild could grasp its effectiveness! But there’s more to my worries. Being imprisoned between these imposing peaks makes me wonder whether our campaign plan should be changed.”

“To what end?” Lucius asked.

“Persephone said it best,” Vespasian answered. “Because we can simply pluck the gold from nature as one might harvest fruit from a tree, our work proceeds exceedingly fast. Soon we will have sent more gold home to Ellistium than we ever dreamed possible. Perhaps we should then abandon this valley and move on, for it is too far away from home for us to hold as conquered territory. I long for the maneuvering room that only being away from these imposing peaks can afford. Here in this valley we toil like rats in a trap.”

“There is little else that we can do for now,” Lucius said. “I suggest that we review the process for sending the gold home. More than anything else, it will remind us why we ventured into this barbaric land.”

Letting go a short smile, Vespasian nodded. “Very well,” he said to Lucius. “Lead on.”

The trio sauntered along the Alarik toward one of the many staging areas where the gold was being weighed and the sums tallied before being shipped home. Many such stations lay up and down the length of the valley. Despite the hundreds of thousands of eager legionnaires working away, Vespasian knew that even if his forces toiled here for months, they couldn’t harvest a fraction of the massive Shashidan deposits. Although their take would be vast, in a strange way that knowledge also disheartened him.

In the end, what will we have accomplished? he wondered as he walked. No matter how much gold his legions took from this place, the amount would be finite. He could imagine the imperial coffers back in Ellistium full to overflowing as never before. But for how long would the plunder last?

Unless he struck Shashida a fatal blow here and now, not even thePon Q’tar could predict how long the War of Attrition might continue. Given the great wealth of this valley, Shashida might be able to finance her war needs endlessly. Soldiers and weapons of war were replaceable, up to a point. But because Rustannica’s indigenous gold deposits were nearing depletion, Rustannica could again become a victim of her own successes, and even the stolen gold reserves would one day be used up.

Taking Ryoto was the key, he knew. If he could kill the members of theChikara Inkai and the Kokkai Kokumen, the total defeat of Shashida would soon follow. But how much gold should be harvested before he ordered this valley abandoned? And when he did, in what direction should he send his legions-homeward to safety, or onward toward Ryoto and an uncertain future?

At first his goal had been only to send as much gold as possible to Ellistium, then retreat homeward to fight this war another day and with vastly renewed strength. But no Rustannican force in history had advanced this close to Ryoto. Taking the Shashidan capital was so tempting that he knew he must strategize only with his head, not his heart. Then Vespasian smiled wryly as he remembered that being on campaign was always a far different and far uglier thing than was proposing it to the Suffragat in the luxurious surroundings of the Aedifficium.

Were his legions’ recent successes due to luck, he wondered, or were the Shashidans cleverly drawing him in? Now that his new gifts had been realized and Ryoto lay before him, should he continue this fight to its finish? That was what Gracchus wanted. And what of theJin’Sai? he wondered. If Tristan reached Shashida, he was surely in Ryoto, plotting with theChikara Inkai. As Gracchus said, there would be no better time for Vespasian to kill theJin’Sai than now, hopefully before the Vigors mystics could imbue Tristan’s blood with spells that might match his own…

“Here we are,” Lucius announced, returning Vespasian to the issue at hand. “What say you, my liege? It goes well, don’t you think?”

The scene before them was amazing in its scope and efficiency. No other force on earth could accomplish so much so fast, Vespasian realized as he watched his legionnaires and mystics go about their unique labors.

Like the many other staging areas dotting the valley, this one was supervised by a tribune. Vespasian knew Antonius Tertia well, as they had served together on many campaigns. As the Lead Tribune of the Thirty-third Legion, Antonius had acquired a fearsome battle reputation, and like Lucius he was a legendary womanizer. Tall and broad, he wore a great red beard. Like the other legionnaires toiling under the hot Shashidan sun, he had stripped down to his waist, and his bare skin shone with the sweat of his labors. As the trio approached he did not look up, involved as he was in recording the latest tallies in a beeswax diptych.

Vespasian smiled. “Are you so greedy to collect Shashidan gold that you have no words for an old friend?” he chided the tribune.

Looking up from his book, Antonius smiled back and gave the three visitors a perfect salute.

“Indeed not, my liege!” he said robustly. “Your visit is an honor!”

After paying his respects to the empress and Lucius, Antonius gestured toward the amazing sight. “Impressive, is it not?” he asked. “All of this gold, ours for the taking!”

As the legionnaires harvested the gold by hand from the riverbeds and mountainsides, it was loaded onto horse-drawn carts. The six-horse teams then drew the gold toward larger wagons. The larger wagons measured ten meters long by five meters wide and were built of stout Rustannican oak with iron-braced floors. When filled to the brim, each cart carried about ten tons of pure gold. Then each cart was pulled by a team of six great beasts into the azure portal located at each staging area, where it was sent by way of the craft to Ellistium. There the cart was unloaded, and it and its beasts were returned to the valley by tribune mystics under the command of Flavius Maximus, Vespasian’s choice as Imperator Tempitatus.