It is said that humans plan, but the Divines decide. So many of life’s critical events cannot be anticipated and cannot, even viewed with the clarity of hindsight, be attributed to any specific cause. From the expedition’s long-term campsite where we were betrayed and shattered to the nearest crossing of the Shdulus River was a journey of three days minimum, over very harsh terrain. The knowledge that death lies behind you is a great spur to extra effort, and despite considerable difficulties, speed was not lost in those days of flight. Additionally, the reduced size of the expedition allowed for more rapid progress than before, as both those who were lazy and inclined to shirk the road, and those who were weak and unable to press hard without help were among the elements turned traitor. Of the thirty-four who remained it was probably the Princess Romou who represented the weakest hiker, for she was of slight build and had small feet, but time upon the road and in Shdustu had hardened her compared to a life in palaces and temples. Though her pace was not especially swift, she was more than capable of walking all day before her horse and had long since learned to remained comfortable on her feet when paired with quality boots.
Escape ought to have been possible. Reduced though we were, much martial prowess remained to the expedition. Twelve men of the Imperial guard were joined by the three Nikkad women under Rubuya, all formidable fighters. The Redbones too, knew the arts of combat with their long spears and piercing blades. Even the remaining caravaneers and I were armed and knew something of weapons, and all understood we would need to fight to the last, for the Bahab would surely execute any captives. I would not account myself a match for any Bahab hunter-warrior if it came to long knife versus spear, but no man who stands armed can be fully ignored. Erun submitted that he believed we could emerge victorious from a fight against twice our number, though it would be very bloody. A force of forty-some warriors does not sound large, but the Dumum Mountains are harsh and Bahab villages are small. To ensure vengeance and to be certain that his losses in claiming it would not incur a second tragedy, the chieftain of the Black Spruce would need to muster the full strength of his tribe, every trained hand or near enough.
The plan of escape presumed that such a mustering would take more than three days. By that point we would cross the river and enter territory claimed by the Gray Birch tribe. They could act as a shield to preserve our lives. Erun suggested this plan and gathered together all trinkets and wealth remaining to us in the hope of providing sufficient tribute to secure cooperation, knowing that such a boon would not be purchased merely out of gratitude.
Unfortunately, the Divines arranged circumstances such that this was not to be. A week earlier, it was later learned, the chieftain of the Black Spruce tribe had gathered up a major force of warriors in anticipation of a late summer raid on the Kharal to the south, seeking to rustle livestock prior to the fall slaughter of the yearlings. Such raids are common at this time of year, for the yearlings are a precious resource. As such, when word came to the chieftain that the foreigners he had so graciously allowed to remain in his lands for the entire summer had slaughtered his loggers unprovoked, he was ready to march at once, and did so with great haste. The Lord of Death, it seems, found it appropriate that vengeance complete its inevitable bitter cycle.
On the second evening of our flight, we observed the campfires of the pursuing Bahab for the first time. Erun ordered a forced march in the morning in the hope that we might reach and cross the river before nightfall. He believed that, should the enemy be forced to attempt a crossing to fight us, our crossbowmen might prove superior despite any disparity of numbers. This, despite much effort, was not achieved. The Bahab knew paths through the mountains swifter than any trail we could follow, and by traveling without any pack animals, the warriors could abandon the trails entirely, scrambling bodily over stony paths that allowed them to cut across shortcuts shaving away hundreds of meters of separation at a time.
It is likely that it would not have mattered in any case, for by late summer the flow of the Shdulus River this far north is inconsequential. It was not even twenty meters wide and sufficiently shallow to wade across without getting the waist damp. As the spring snowmelt causes the river to rage and flood each year, the channel is embedded within a wide-open space. This muddy alpine meadow covered in grass and herbs had been heavily browsed by deer and offered a rare point devoid of covering vegetation.
The Dragon Expedition reached the river even as our ears twitched to hear the arrival of the Bahab warband, and at this moment the open space worked against us. The Bahab fight with great two-handed swords, brutal halberds, and heavy maces used to shatter bear skulls, but they also wield long and powerful bows formed from the slow-growing tight-grained wood of gnarled mountain trunks with impressive carry and broadhead points designed to pierce deep. Even as we ran down to the river, those bows were strung. It became absolutely certain that we would not escape across. Confrontation was inevitable.
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The chieftain of the Black Spruce Bahab was a middle-aged man named Talif. He had a thick black beard, a scar across his nose from a mace blow, and carried into battle the very fine sword Erun Nassah had given him months before in return for his gracious, now hideously violated, hospitality. He, alone among his warriors, rode a horse. From such a prominent post, his fine furs layered over mail and inscribed with the dark tree sign of his tribe were instantly recognizable.
As soon as he walked his mount into view, Talif took the sword he’d been given in one hand, a heavy mace in the other, and shattered the blade with swift blows in a wordless declaration of intent. His gathered warband, numbering nearly one hundred and twenty men, including dozens of elite warriors with sufficient deeds to their names to wear wolfskins over their helmets, drew up in line behind him.
It is not my purpose, in composing this chronicle, to pass judgment upon others. I have tried, as much as possible, to allow actions to speak for themselves, that the reader may draw their own conclusions. Despite this, I am not so naïve as to expect that my words should have no influence at all. Such matters cannot be avoided by any scholar. Erun Nassah, appointed by the hand of Husun the Fifth, born of illustrious lineage in a clan with a heritage of high office, was a figure tied to politics by birth and station alike. His ultimate fate is inevitably placed within such context. As there is no one else to speak on the matter, I recognize that it falls to me to inscribe his place in the history of the Sanid Empire.
He was not a perfect man. He had a tendency to drink too much, especially at feasts. He could be uncompromising in his leadership and was given to expect too much of the common people in pursuit of glory that they could never share. Yet no human is flawless, and character is revealed in moments of grave trial. When the ultimate test came, Erun Nassah rose and met it with the furious will only a true son of the Sanid Empire could muster.
As the Bahab drew up into line of battle, he turned his horse about to face them and gave a series of orders, never hesitating. I can recall those words perfectly even now. “Misod. Command now falls to you. See the Princess returned home and fulfill the goals of the expedition. Rubuya, this is not your fight. The Princess must have an escort. Defend her, that is your charge now. Men of the Imperial Guard.” He drew his sword and waved it above his head. “The hour has come when all duties shall be done. Stand forth! Show Shdustu the strength of the Sairn!”
As ordered, I led twenty-one people across the river and on a mad dash for the trees in the distance where arrows could not reach. Not one of us dared look back, even as the terrible, haunting sounds of battle carried toward us. We fled blindly upwards, toward the high pass and the Gray Birch lands beyond with our legs burning until nightfall saw us collapse upon the trail. The end of Erun Nassah and the twelve brave soldiers of the Imperial Guard who stood beside them and charged into the face of an enemy ten times their number was witnessed only by their foes and the Divines.
Erun’s charge had a dual purpose, to secure our escape and to display the strength of the Sanid Empire. He did this knowing that doing so demanded the sacrifice of his own life and that of all soldiers under his command. Let this chronicle make one thing clear: he succeeded. The twenty-one still loyal members of the expedition escaped. No further pursuit came from the Black Spruces. They were not, it was later learned, in any position to offer any.
Ten to one odds. Thirteen men against one hundred and twenty. An utterly hopeless battle. And yet, the cost is known. On the banks of the Shgutu River, in the eighth month of the eleventh year of Enduring Peace, thirteen soldiers of the Sanid Empire perished to the last. Forty-one Black Spruce Bahab were sent to meet the Lord of Death, either in battle itself or subsequently from their wounds, and over two dozen more took wounds that would leave lifelong scars. The warband would not fully recover for over a decade. These facts are known for a simple reason. The chieftain Talif arranged to have Erun’s sword, recognizable by the inlay of his clan and personal crests, returned to the empire. He felt his valor insufficient to claim such a weapon and indeed he offered his regrets to the emperor for pursuing vengeance against the wrong party, recognizing that no soldiers such as made a stand of valor and sacrifice as the guardsmen did could possibly be those who had cowardly murdered his loggers.
The halberds of the Winged Guards were claimed by the Bahab, and these weapons remain in the Dumum Mountains, carrying forward the tale of this grim day so long as steel shall last. The people of those mountains learned the mettle of Empire and responded with respect. In the grand scheme of politics, thirteen lives are a small price to pay for such a lesson. At the time, I knew only that this great sacrifice saved our lives, if only for the moment. The night that followed was a terrible one indeed. We collapsed into our blankets scattered along a miserable game trail. The strength to stand barely remained, and we had no knowledge as to whether pursuit continued. Grief too, struck unsparingly, for all who had known Erun respected him, and most of those who remained had been friends with several of the guardsmen. Some might say that the expedition suffered a mortal wound that day, though I find such conclusions far removed from the truth.