Брайан Макклеллан - Blood of Empire

“Do we know what they have planned?”

“The deserter said they have orders to hold for reinforcements. I imagine if we give them a proper encirclement, they’ll surrender by this time tomorrow.”

Something ugly reared its head inside Vlora at that moment. Her lip curled involuntarily, and she couldn’t help but think of the doggedness with which the Dynize had pursued her, of the betrayals of the Fatrastans, of the losses both personal and professional that she had suffered since the Dynize arrived at Landfall.

“Colonel, I want your battery to bombard the town into submission.”

Silvia looked uncertain. “Shouldn’t we demand their surrender first?”

“I think they’ll get the message.”

“And civilians from the town?”

Fatrastans. Betrayers. Enemies. “Try not to hit too many of them,” Vlora said coldly. “Davd.”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Get Norrine and Buden. Kill every officer you see. I won’t accept a surrender from any officer with an equivalent rank of master sergeant or above.”

Davd swallowed hard. “Should we let them know that?”

“As I said, they’ll get the message.” Vlora turned away, gesturing for them to carry out their orders. That ugly thing was now rooted firmly in her breast, and she felt like she was watching someone else order the butchering of an enemy brigade. She tried to dig her way out of this fresh-found fury – and was unsuccessful.

“Where are you going, ma’am?” Silvia asked.

“To find a good place from which to watch.”

Vlora spent the day watching the heavy bombardment of Lower Blackguard. Throughout the morning and afternoon, more gun crews trickled in from the various brigades. They flattened sections of the hillside, brought in their guns and artillery, and joined Colonel Silvia in the relentless attack.

Word must have spread that Vlora had emerged from her tent, because a steady stream of messengers and well-wishing officers had cropped up by noon. She listened to their platitudes and reports, taking them all in with the same cool nod, and sat in her camp chair with her pitted sword across her lap. It felt good to let the sun play on her face after so long cooped up, and the report of the guns gave her a feeling of warmth that bordered on frightening.

The first white flag emerged from Lower Blackguard at about two in the afternoon. Vlora could tell by the lacquered breastplate that it was an officer, and the woman didn’t make it halfway to Vlora’s lines before she fell to a gunshot from one of Vlora’s mages. The second white flag came out an hour later and met the same fate.

Just after that second one died, Vlora spotted Nila picking her way through the camp. The Privileged approached the artillery battery, where she spoke with Silvia and several of the gun crews, but did not add her sorcery to the bombardment. Vlora watched her cautiously, wondering how long it would take for Nila to approach and question her methods.

“You’re shooting their messengers before they can surrender,” a voice noted.

Vlora started and cursed under her breath. She’d been so focused on Nila that she hadn’t heard Bo approach from behind. He had a collapsible camp chair over one shoulder and unfolded it, plopping down beside Vlora and letting out a pleased sigh as he unhooked his false leg and began to fiddle with the ankle mechanism.

“I swear that thing only makes noise when you want it to,” Vlora accused.

Bo smiled but didn’t look up from his leg. “You’re punishing them,” he said with a nod across the valley.

“If you want to call it that, sure,” Vlora responded. She felt suddenly surly, uninterested in listening to any sort of reproach from anyone – even the adopted brother who’d helped save her life. She began preparing for an argument, cataloging Bo’s past atrocities, ready to accuse the Privileged of doing anything and everything for his own ends.

She was surprised when he simply gave a small shrug. “Could be useful. But is it a great idea to shoot messengers under a white flag?”

She opened her mouth, closed it, and felt that ugly anger stir in her belly. “They would do the same to me without hesitation.”

“You’re certain of that?” Bo asked.

“Yes.”

“Ah.” Bo finally worked a bit of grit out of the ankle mechanism of his false leg and hooked it back to his knee. “Then, carry on!”

“I’m glad you approve.”

Bo glanced across the valley, but he had that distant look in his eyes as if he had already moved on to other, more important thoughts. Vlora tried to read anything deeper from his expression but was unsuccessful. She sighed and looked over her shoulder to where Davd sat on the hillside some ten feet behind her – far enough to give her some room but close enough to come quickly if needed. Davd was smoking a cigarette, and Vlora wondered when he had started. She opened her mouth to ask Bo if he’d seen Olem, only to remember that Olem was still gone. His absence caused her to ache as badly as did the rest of her body. She wished he had not left.

“What’s the state of Fatrasta between here and Landfall?” Bo asked.

Vlora pulled her eyes away from the bombardment. “You mean you’ve been here for over a month and you don’t have your spy network in place? I assumed you’d know everything before I did.”

“Don’t be silly. I know most things before you do, not everything. But your soldiers are particularly loyal right now, what with their general sacrificing herself for their comrades and then rising from the ashes. It’s hard to get much out of them.”

Vlora snorted. “That’s reassuring.” She let her gaze linger on a group of Adran privates watching her from a distance of about twenty yards. She couldn’t read their faces, not without a powder trance, but something about them left her unsettled. She tried to put them out of her mind and leaned forward in her chair, using her sword to scratch a bit of bare earth out of the grassland and then drawing in it. “Here’s the coast,” she said, making a line. “Here’s us, and here’s Landfall.” They’d started out at the Crease, about three hundred miles north of Landfall. The army had managed to cover roughly half of that distance while Vlora recuperated.

She stabbed another dot into the ground. “The Adran fleet is shadowing our flank, dealing with any Dynize ships so that nothing lands behind us and making sure we’re well supplied.”

“And the enemy?” Bo asked.

“Field armies here, here, and here,” Vlora answered. “All Dynize. The Fatrastans have been beaten badly, but they’re not out of the fight. Rumor has it they’ve got at least four hundred thousand men fielded down here.” She drew a circle around the area to the northwest of Landfall. “Mostly conscripts. They’re better armed than the Dynize, but they don’t have the discipline or sorcery. Lindet’s a wily one, though, so I won’t count her beat until I see her head on a spike.”

“Is that what you intend to do with her?” Bo asked.

Vlora’s stomach churned. “I’ll deal with her when I have to. Regardless, we won’t know about the true state of the Fatrastan military until we get around the south end of the Ironhook Mountains. The Dynize field armies are our immediate problem, particularly…” She jabbed at one of the spots she’d poked in the dirt. “That one there.” She drew a small horn in the dirt, jutting out from the coast, on which was perched the city of New Adopest. Her last intelligence told her that the city was under siege by a Dynize army. “We’ll lose valuable time if we go out of our way to confront them, but if we don’t, we’ll leave forty thousand infantry at our rear.”