37
The goodbyes were all too swift. Othello, Cress and Atilla had received their marching orders from the King that very morning, commissioning all three as officers in the dwarven battalion. Cress had sniffled as she bade Fletcher farewell, and both Fletcher and Othello had to surreptitiously wipe at their eyes after a gruff hug. The three dwarves departed before the convoy had even left, eager to take command of their men. He had not envied them – while he only had to manage thirty-two soldiers, theirs would number in the hundreds.
Sylva flew to meet the elven army on their way down from the north, and her soft, parting kiss on Fletcher’s cheek lingered long after she and Lysander disappeared into the sky. Fletcher caught her backward glance as she took off. It was a bittersweet reminder of what he knew could never be.
In the rush to prepare for the expedition, he had almost forgotten that he would be parting ways with his dearest friends, and he felt their loss even before they were out of sight. Worst of all would be his mother, whom he had not had time to visit. It was only thanks to the knowledge that he could fly back on Ignatius and visit her that he could bring himself to leave at all. Until then, Harold had promised she would receive the best care that the doctors of Corcillum could provide.
One happy surprise came with the discovery that Thaissa would be joining the colonists. She shyly introduced her husband before embarking on their wagon, a young dwarven blacksmith named Millo who had apprenticed beneath Uhtred before opening his own workshop.
There was a brief scramble as Uhtred held up the morning traffic of carriages so their convoy could leave, and then they were off in a rumble of wheels and clopping trotters on the cobbled streets. Dwarves waved handkerchiefs as they passed, others running up and handing them last-minute gifts of food as the wagons rolled by. Within the hour they were outside of the city and trundling along the dusty road south, surrounded by the rolling hills of crops and minor hamlets.
At first, Fletcher rode at the front with Sir Caulder and Berdon, but soon the pair’s eyes grew heavy, for the two were exhausted from their long journey down south. So as they slept, he climbed out on to the roof plate, sitting beside the dwarven wagon master and discussing the route ahead. But the old dwarf seemed fearful, constantly looking over his shoulder. Fletcher asked what he was afraid of.
‘Bandits,’ the wagon master replied curtly, staring out across the empty landscape.
It was only then that Fletcher realised how valuable their convoy actually was. Leaving aside his share of the prize money, stashed in his satchel, the contents of the wagons could be sold for a great deal on the black market. They were a prime target for any one of the roving bands of highwaymen that ranged across Hominum, and his little band of soldiers were far from prepared to defend it.
Someone needed to scout the surrounding area. So he jumped from the wagon and walked into a nearby cornfield. He watched as the convoy rolled past, and was pleased to see that Sir Caulder had placed his soldiers on three wagons in the front, middle and back, preparing the convoy for attack from any direction. There were twenty vehicles in all, and each was hitched to a pair of boars, enormous animals as large as donkeys and twice as wide. He watched the strange beasts as he waited for them to pass by, fascinated by the marmalade colouring of their bristly fur and the short tusks that curved from their lower jaws.
Then, when the wagons were out of sight, he summoned Ignatius and Athena, and took off. It was as exhilarating as it had been the first time, to shoot into the sky and watch the road turn into a thin brown line along the patchwork yellow-green quilt of the surrounding fields. But this time it was better – there were no demons to fear, no orcs to escape. The sky was all but empty, filled only with wisps of cloud and, far in the distance, a skein of geese flying in formation.
Athena’s wing was still on the mend, though well on its way to being usable again, so she perched on Ignatius’s rump and peered out over the landscape. To the east, Fletcher could see the distant shape of Vocans, half obscured by a haze of morning mist. For a moment he was tempted to fly by it, perhaps even catch a glimpse of students through the domed skylight on its roof. Only the safety of the convoy held him back.
At first Fletcher had wished for Pria’s heat vision, but he needn’t have worried – Athena’s sharp eyes missed nothing. So the rest of the day was spent gliding on the breeze, searching the plains surrounding the convoy for suspicious movements. But if there were any bandits, they did not show themselves. Only the occasional goatherd and his flock broke the stillness of the plains – that and the thin streams of chimney smoke from the rare sleepy hamlet that dotted the landscape.
As they journeyed on, the land became less and less populated. Fields of crops became rocky hills, and the remains of scattered homesteads long abandoned appeared as overgrown mounds of rubble and tile. Fletcher knew that the front lines lay just beyond the horizon, and the ground below them had been ravaged by endless conflict between orc and man: from the orc raids in the centuries before the war began, to the bloody battles since. The entire area was devoid of human life, a buffer between civilisation and savagery.
The road beneath branched, one path heading towards the southern front, the other curving west, towards the Vesanian Sea. The convoy took the west road, and now the going became slower. Fletcher swooped for a closer look, and saw that the route was poorly maintained. Weeds and wayward roots had invaded the dirt road, requiring Sir Caulder to occasionally call a halt and order the recruits to hack apart the scrub. At other times muddy puddles blocked the way, and the passengers were forced to get off and walk around so that the heavy wagons weren’t bogged down as the wheels churned through the mires.
And so it went on. Afternoon turned to dusk, until the setting sun hung fat and yellow on the skyline. Still the road stretched into the horizon, and Fletcher was forced to send wyrdlights down to illuminate their way, great balls of raw mana that ate at his reserves but hung above the convoy like miniature blue moons.
It was around midnight when they reached the river. In the dark of night the water looked black, rushing silent beneath a wide stone bridge that looked as if it had stood there since the beginning of time. It was the marker for where Raleighshire began, the land behind them owned by the King, the land beyond … his.
As the convoy crossed over, he listened to the fearful snorts of the boars, skittish at the sound of the roiling water beneath them. His mind wandered to the history of this place. A great battle had been fought here once, named after the bridge itself – Watford Bridge.
They were in savannah country now – what had once been a sea of undulating green took on a yellow tinge, flat and interspersed with copses of trees and shrubs. The road was barely existent, overgrown with tall grasses and strewn with stray rocks and nascent plants. Faced with the wild growth of almost two decades, Fletcher’s recruits were forced to use their poleaxes to hack a path, working from the early morning hours to the first hint of dawn. The dwarves and villagers lent a hand, carrying the detritus aside as the soldiers cut it away.
And then, as the first rays of the sun spread across the sky, he saw it.
Raleightown.