Inro's hopes for a short sojourn faded quickly. Gritting his teeth, he settled in for the long game, throwing himself into learning a working vocabulary of the barbarian's tongue with the same dedication, force, and focus he turned on whatever task he deemed important or necessary.
So far, his work earned him a hut providing nearly as much comfort as his campaign tent, a cadre of young warriors who followed wherever he went, mimicked everything he did, and wrenched his heart with memories of the soldiers rotting on the fields of Sunset. He smothered such unfittingly-soft emotions and transformed them into cool, smoldering anger to fuel his resolve further. Eager village girls fought for the right to sate his nightly urges, making up for quality in quantity and zeal.
In the process of integrating with the tribe, Inro learned that the handful he and his Feral had fought had been an expedition scouting in preparation for a raid against another tribe called the Libwe. The Libwe, if he understood correctly, recently seized for itself the 'holy' Limn clay bed and now refused any other tribes' shaman any access.
A smart, strategic move on that tribe's part if they managed to overcome their superstitions long enough to armor their warriors in it. Well-generaled, such a warband might give a full Legion of Inro's soldiers trouble. If Aj hadn't utterly annihilated his Sunset Legions, that is. Thoughts of what carnage and havoc Aj might be wreaking at that very moment stabbed him with despair, but this emotion too he crushed and refined into cold anger.
He briefly debated presenting the heads of Arca and the shaman, Izbali, to the Libwe to earn their favor. Not only did he not understand these savage menials' culture enough to know how they might respond, however, but he loathed the idea of duplicating all the effort he'd expended ingratiating himself with his current band of savages. The thought of lopping Arca's competent and canny head off wouldn't give him any pleasure either.
No, the plan he'd devised with Arca stood better chance of success.
Arca's acuity at learning Ebonese far outstripped Inro's capacity to learn their nonsense tongue and the new chieftain quickly saw the wisdom in Inro's plans. They met substantial push-back from the tribal elders and only when Izbali unexpectedly stepped up to support them during a particularly-heated argument did the elders grudgingly give in.
Now they stood atop a flat-topped pinnacle of red rock overlooking the broken rockland. They'd reached the spire's heights by scrambling the scree at its base, climbing steep, hand-hewn stone stairs, squeezing through narrow defiles, and finally ascending the last sheer face via a heavily-worn set of holes barely deep enough to fit a hand into.
Six other tribes agreed to meet. Their peoples gathered far below in separate, suspicious camps while their leadership clumped about the top of the pinnacle performing the fourth hour of tedious ceremony and ritual these primitives smothered in on the way to doing anything useful.
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Smoke this. Burn that. Tear this. Throw it to the wind. Chant this. Uncover hair. Argue about whose is longer or thicker. Compare reptile-skin headdresses. Sing that. Face the sun. Swear this oath. Turn away from the sun. Untie necklaces. Exchange. Dance. Offer a trinket as a gift. Refuse. Offer again. Take it. Sing again.
When the superstitious gibberish finally concluded, they settled down to the boasting, chest-banging, finger pointing, shouting, long speeches, words of wisdom, and other games a group of big fish thrashed through when meeting in a small pond.
Inro sat quietly, moving as little as possible to increase the sense of wonder and mystery about him. Also to keep from drawing a sword and killing all of these puffed-up, strutting cocks when this whole gathering posed yet another in an endless series of delays to his escaping this damned verse and returning to what really mattered.
After conniving with Inro, Arca met each of the other six chiefs in secret the days prior, promising every one of them literally whatever they wished after their upcoming combined attack on the Libwe tribe holding the Limn beds. All this ceremonious bluster for show while each chieftain and elder gloated knowing they'd already brokered the best deal.
After an eternity, the meeting ended.
All present took the shared gourd to drink peace, thus sealing the agreement between them. The gathered warriors of the seven tribes would assault the Libwe in the morning. Each departed happy knowing victory, glory, and the largest share of the spoils would be theirs on the morrow.
Arca turned to Inro, speaking his broken Ebonese since Arca took to the language like an eel to a lake while Inro could barely ask where to relieve himself without insulting someone or breaking some taboo in their stupid, convoluted tongue. "Sure this way? Bester way?"
Inro nodded. "We need them all together for it to work, yes."
Izbali watched them with dark, luminous eyes. Inro had never once heard the woman utter a word excepting ceremonial chant and song. He hadn't made up his mind whether the cause pointed towards wisdom, simplicity, or an intentionally-manufactured persona not unlike the one Inro wore.
"We many to them. Libwe have Limn. Not know end." Arca paced as he spoke, occasionally glancing down at the procession of chieftains winding their way carefully down a dangerous path made even more so by the dusky sun.
Similar doubts made Inro feel like pacing himself, but he'd be damned to a Feral before showing it. "Battles and certainty never coexist. We've assessed our strengths and weaknesses, gauged everyone else's, and aligned ourselves appropriately to stack things in our favor as much as possible. The Libwe hold the Limn and the high ground. The tribes we've assembled outnumber them several times over. Who knows how it will play out when the spears clash and the blood flows? All we can do is think it through as much as we can, plan for contingencies, commit fully to our decisions, and adapt as things change."
Arca thrust a finger the general direction of the bluff where the Libwe awaited them. "What wrong tribes victory?"
Then Inro escapes in the confusion hoping the Libwe don't guard their Limn beds too closely while they're murdering the men, raping the women, and enslaving the children. "We salvage what we can, regroup, and improvise."
They stood on the pinnacle going over again every detail of the attack and their part in it until the sun's descent forced them to depart or face the already-treacherous descent in the dark.