Frozen dirt was objectively the worst dirt you could ever have to deal with. Sure, cold dirt was a close second as it just generally made the stuff harder to cut through, but when you were digging in the middle of winter and had to make it through that first extra hard layer of frozen dirt? That was hell itself.

Harrant had come to the conclusion after several days of digging straight. Small holes littered the open field between the surging river and the treeline opposite the keep at Fort Seton. They hadn't even been bothering to hide the holes all that much, digging them right in view of whoever was set up in their camp across from the fort. The sounds of war drums echoed over the open wasteland of shallow holes lined with small wooden spikes, a veritable zone of death before the fight had even really started. And here Doug was, digging holes in the middle of winter. Objectively, unarguably, the worst.

He looked up from his work as he threw yet another shovel full of cold brown good for nothing dirt out of his hole. Down the line he saw the tall or short forms of several of his squad members, depending on how far they had progressed on their current hole. A look back at the wall confirmed that the soldiers up there were in fact still watching out for them. Only a small improvement on the fact that they'd probably still die if the forest dwellers attacked right now. At least they'd be seen as they were cut down. A soldier's true dream. To be witnessed.

“I'm not a fucking soldier.” Harrant grumbled, returning to his work.

The drums continued to pound away in the distance, only really quieting during the night when it seemed like they went to bed. When he'd last been on night duty he remembered the way the drums had picked up near twilight, increasing in tempo until he was sure that they might come bounding out of the woodline at any moment. Instead, he watched as several gouts of flame shot up into the night sky, lighting up the inside of their camp for only the barest of moments before his vision was hampered by the darkness once again.

It had all the tell-tale signs of a flamer camp. The drums, the makeshift tents set up out in the woods, and especially the random fireworks in the middle of the night. It had to be them. And yet that made almost no sense at all.

The idea that even a single desert tribe could survive long enough in the haunted marshes to make it across the Golden Kingdom's northern border all the way to the coastline? Now that could never happen. The tribesmen had no reason to make a journey this far in the first place. And even if they did want to come here, the arcanists certainly wouldn't have let them.

And yet, here they were. Slamming out a hell of a tempo for Doug to dig to. Not that it helped. Doug reached out of his nearly complete hole to grab a couple wooden stakes, and started hammering it into the ground with the end of his shovel.

Only half the field to go.

—

Harrant and his men had been released for the night for a bit of rest and relaxation. Anywhere in the fort town was free game for them to peruse and explore, as long as they didn't leave the town walls. The fact that none of them had much left in the way of coin only made that a little bit on the harder side for the squad.

They'd been promised a hell of a payday when they got back to the capital in a couple of weeks whenever things blew over. The hazard pay for the convoy trip in addition to a couple weeks of temporary duty at a different fort were sure to end with a good payout, assuming they lived to tell the tale. But when it came to the here and now, that didn't do them very much good at all.

The boys had taken to gathering at a small tavern near the dock-side of town called the ‘Swirling Mug’. Calling this half of town dock-side was a bit of a misnomer, considering there was only room for perhaps two ships in total inside of the small port. The massive port chains had already been drawn up tight against the waves, preventing anyone from making an assault via boat through the tight waterside walls into the narrow canal. Still, from the perspective of a small fort focused entirely on the defense of the nation, perhaps that was still enough to be called a dock.

As they settled into the small bar, his men were in a particularly bad mood today. That was fairly par for the course as of recently, but the sudden forced labor of ditch digging for the last couple of days had certainly been a whole new low for the crew. Nine despondent faces saddled up to the large table, even Oleg rejoining the crew on their outings now that his leg had healed up. A simple barmaid walked over to fill their cups with the watered down swill that they called ale in the dusty old tavern, and his men settled into their cups with a lackluster gusto.

“So lads, how many of us do you wanna bet are gonna get killed within the next month?” Collin started the conversation out on a high point.

“At least half of us, for sure.” Edgar said.

“Yeah, but does that count as four, or five?”

“That matters?”

“Well yeah. Got to have the numbers straight if we're gonna bet on it.” The two argued back and forth on the highs and lows of their wager while the edges of the table split off into different conversations. Harrant listened to it all with a mild curiosity about the situation.

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

He'd sat with his men at bars before, listening to them bicker like this for the better part of the last couple years as he slowly built his crew from the ground up. He knew them all, for better and for worse, and had been thought of as a friend when it came to their work. But now, things were getting complicated. Despite the fact they all knew they were simply plants in the army, he still felt the way the guys interacted with him changing. He was still allowed to come out to the town with them, sure, but the way they avoided starting conversations with him directly was starting to become noticable.

They'd changed. And Harrant wasn't sure whether he could just blame it on the new uniforms. If only they hadn't come to this frozen hell-hole in the first place.

As if to mark his words, a bell started tolling in the distance off in the direction of the pier. The men went silent at once, straining their ears to try and figure out what the rhythm was trying to tell them before Oleg seemed to find the answer first.

“Muster Bell.” The men grumbled and got out of their seats as the majority chugged what was left of their mugs before setting off into the afternoon chill.

The bells continued to toll, growing louder and louder as they walked over to the pier and a growing formation of men that had organized into rank and column. Harrant's men filtered over haphazardly into the trailing end of the rectangular box of soldiers while a loud ratcheting sound echoed over the open waves ahead of them. He looked over at the source of the strange noise, and noted the fact that it looked like the chain port defense was being lowered into the water so a boat could pass.

“What are we even doing here?” Edgar asked no one in particular.

“Wasting our free hours away, that's what.” Oleg responded under his breath.

Someone walked up to the front of the formation and started talking loudly to the assembled crowd.

“Alright, lock it up now. We've got a special guest coming to visit the fort and the commander wants you all to look as proper as you can manage under the circumstances. So if you think you're already too drunk to last the fifteen minutes we'll be standing by, fall out to the rear and I'll have a talk with you personally.”

“Tempting.” Someone said quietly, but no one moved. The unspoken threat in those words was all too understood by the men gathered here today.

Minutes passed by without much change to the situation as men bent their knees every couple seconds to keep the blood flowing. A handful of subdued conversations being held near the back of the formation cut off as a rather large boat started making its way into the small port, green banisters hanging loosely from the bow of the ship with a picture of a black eye painted in the center of them.

When the ship had finally stopped to the side of the pier and ropes were thrown overboard to start pulling them in, not a single soul spoke as an unseen presence weighed down upon their minds. As a single plank extended from the boat with a series of cut notches in the board to help with traction, the pressure redoubled as a single man appeared at the top of the walkway.

A large black fur cloak lined his otherwise standard military uniform as a man with short black hair and a stern face marched down the plank without any fanfare. Behind him, a comparatively youthful looking man with much longer black hair followed the man quietly, matching blue prismatic eyes the only remarkable feature in either face. A small girl with long red hair then jumped over the side of the boat and landed casually on the dock, seemingly without a care in the world for the fifteen foot drop or so. The two men just ignored her as they continued walking down the plank.

As they settled onto solid ground, the pressure on Dougs mind redoubled into an overbearing weight that shifted even his shoulders into the ground. Several of the soldiers by his side crumpled to their knees in front of the strange force mages, posting their arms to the ground after they fell trying to help prevent themselves from face planting into the frozen ground where they had formed up. Doug didn't feel all that much better about the situation as his entire body buckled under the weight like he had just chosen to pick up a fully grown man, armor and all. His vision started to swim, the edges turning to black as he felt the blood drain from his head.

Then it stopped.

All at once the pressure was lifted off of him like it had never even existed in the first place as the short haired man casually stepped onto a wooden crate in front of the formation so that everyone could see him. The men who had fallen quickly tried to stand up and blend in with the crowd as the mage started speaking. His voice was low and casual, seemingly uninterested in making sure that everyone could hear him, yet it felt like he was simultaneously speaking directly into Doug's mind at the same time. Like a whisper spoken directly into his ear.

“Soldiers of the Princedom. I share my power with you all, not to awe or cow your spirits, but to show you the magnitude of what we face. Great powers are at work in this world which simple men have little chance to compete with by their own merits alone. Yet together we stand united in opposition to those who wish to take from our country.”

“Stand strong with me in the coming days, or weeks. However long we stand guard at this solemn keep is just another day earned for the peace that our citizens so dearly deserve. This is the very reason why we fight against the magic of the new world. So do not cower when mages of pain, and heretics of greed come knocking on our door with their strange powers. Instead, know that myself, Colonel Rowan, and several others of my most esteemed mage corps stand with you in battle.” The speaker gestured over at the long haired man beside him when he mentioned Roman, though the red haired girl in the background seemed to disappear while Harrant wasn't paying attention.

“Not everyone I see before me will live to see the next season, but those who perish will have earned something extraordinary for the common citizen of this country. You will have earned them time. Time to grow, to experience, and to build the same courage that you show in the face of our enemies. And for that simple fact I thank you. In return, I will protect as many of you as I can in the coming battle, though my end goal is victory at all costs. After all, we cannot fail here. We must not fail.”

The man slammed his fist to his chest and spoke the vow of their people. “Faith in whispers.”

The formation across from him snapped into a matching salute as the man left his box and continued walking towards the keep.

“Faith in whispers.” They said, as one.