“Get ready!” Bordan whispered, and the order was repeated up and down the line. The fireballs going off had been the signal, as the Harvand forces spread far and wide throughout the forest had no way of communicating with one another to time their attack. With a sigh, Edwin donned his new helmet and grabbed his glaive.
After Edwin had finished the last battle with blood drying on his face and hair, Bordan had taken him aside.
“If you’re going to use your head as a battering ram, you need to start wearing a helmet. Don’t look at me like I’m taking your toy away you big baby, you almost got killed today!”
Well, he hadn’t, as Edwin’s cranium was more durable than any steel helmet ever could be, but Bordan didn’t know that.
“If you’re actually going to refuse to wear the one that Quinnick made for you, despite not telling us what’s even wrong with it, at least ask Amos to requisition you a normal one.”
“Wait, I can do that?”
“Of course you can,” Bordan said, rolling his eyes. “You’re in the army. Equipment breaks, needs repairs or gets lost, so the logistics section has spares. Lord Amos is in charge of our battalion logistics, so he can get us pretty much whatever we want from the stores.”
After their conversation Edwin had followed Bordan’s advice, and he’d received a new helmet that same evening. It was a basic, open-faced metal cap, the kind that the light infantry wore. It didn’t restrict his vision, and cutouts for the ears meant that his hearing was almost unaffected, but even in his past life he’d never been a fan of sticking something on his head. Still, Bordan was right, though not in the way he thought. If arrows and spears kept ricocheting off Edwin’s skull, people would get suspicious before long.
The iron helmet didn’t fit the rest of his armor in the slightest, but he’d be damned if he wore the abomination that Quinnick had created. On a rational level, Edwin understood that he was far beyond being inconspicuous, that there were already a number of stories about him making the rounds at the nightly cooking fires. He knew that, but it didn’t change the fact that donning Quinnick’s helmet would feel like giving up. He wasn’t quite ready to accept that he was quickly becoming famous.
The signal came back, confirming that the entire cohort was ready to go, and in the dim light of the waning sun the adventurers rose from the ditches and gullies like ghosts from their graves. Strung out into a long line they made their way toward the road where lanterns glinted between the trees. They went slowly, so as to not give away their position ahead of time. Three hundred meters. Two hundred. One hundred. Fifty. They stopped, the marksmen taking their positions at the front. Whispered words were exchanged, bows creaked, then bolts and arrows zipped toward their targets.
Despite the low light, Edwin could see what they were up against in perfect detail. They were somewhere alongside the back half of the train, where one supply cart followed the other in a long line. Banners of soldiers were interspersed every now and then, but with a full battle taking place at the front, security back here was low. He’d spoken to a few of their own drivers, and what he’d found out was that most of them were normal people, men and women who just wanted to make ends meet. Driving carts for the duchy was no different from driving carts for some merchant or another, right?
Wrong.
Edwin knew that what they were doing was necessary. The people in front might not be wearing armor and holding weapons, but they were part of the enemy division just the same. It was through their work that Marrad could push their armies into Harvand territory, killing Edwin’s fellow countrymen and threatening to conquer their cities. Had they had a choice, would they have chosen to be here?
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The arrows fell, killing the unarmed drivers before they even realized that they weren’t alone. Surprise and shock froze on their faces as they dropped where they stood, never realizing that their last moments had come and passed.
Duke Percival Marrad, Edwin thought darkly, or king, or whatever fancy title you want to call yourself. If I ever get my hands on you I will crack your skull like an egg.
With the first volley completed the marksmen paused, the silence only broken by the creaking of the reloading crossbows. Finally, Bordan ordered the cohort forward.
“Remember:” the former soldier hissed as they passed the treeline and entered the lamplight. “Be quick, but stay quiet for as long as they don’t know we’re here.”
They approached the first wagon and Salissa put a hand on the lock, closing her eyes. They stood there for a few tense seconds, then the lock clicked open.
“Good work,” Edwin whispered, grinning as he pulled open the door and stepped up into the vehicle. Wooden boxes were stacked almost to the ceiling, and he opened the closest one. It was pitch black inside the cart, too dark to see after passing through the light of the lanterns, so he stuck his hand inside to feel at what it contained.
“Some kind of fabric,” he reported to Bordan.
“Burn it.”
Thinking quickly, Edwin upended the open box onto what little floor was accessible, then grabbed two more and hopped out of the cart.
“What’s that for?” Bordan asked, even as he was tossing in an oil-soaked rag he had lit on one of the lamps.
“These should burn well, we can use them as tinder for other carts.”
Bordan closed the door most of the way, then they hurried toward the next cart. The oxen studied them curiously, one of them sniffing at the dead driver by its feet, but they didn’t bother them.
Salissa had already opened the next lock and was jumping down just as they arrived.
“Food,” she answered the unspoken question. “Stasis.”
“On it,” Edwin answered, pulling himself up. The cart looked virtually identical, a large wooden box on wheels filled with smaller wooden boxes, but the moment he passed the threshold Edwin could feel the blanket of the ritual’s effect numbing him to the world. The sounds were dulled, the colors muted, moving and breathing suddenly required effort. There were people who straight up refused to enter stasis rooms, and despite knowing that it wasn’t dangerous as long as you didn’t stay too long, Edwin understood why. In here, the world was holding its breath. Of the numerous effects magic could create, this one was probably the most unnatural.
With quick movements, Edwin moved a stack of boxes right next to the door, exposing the mana crystal in its magesilver mounting. He released the clamps and the crystal popped out easily, returning sounds and smells to Edwin as it did. He climbed out, handing the crystal to Bordan in exchange for a burning rag, which he tossed inside. He followed it up with the contents of one of the boxes he’d grabbed, spare tabards in Marrad red that he piled next to the small flame. Leaving the door open just a bit, he hurried after his teammates to the next cart when cries went up from the back end of the train.
“Someone came to check,” Bordan said as Edwin rounded the corner. “We’re about to be spotted.”
They were just finishing with the next cart when more shouts came from the opposite direction. One of the banners spread throughout the train had to have made their way toward the noise at the rear, only to come across the pillaging adventurers.
“So much for stealth,” Edwin said, looking at Bordan. “Where to?”
“Let’s work our way toward the front, see if we can meet up with one of the other forces. If we push fast enough, we should be able to trap some of the enemies between them and us and wipe them out quickly.”
They took off at a jog, collecting other adventurers on the way. Wherever another team had problems with a lock or with starting a fire, Salissa quickly stepped in to help them. Three minutes later they arrived at the fight. In the light of the lamps Marradi infantrymen were pushing back the adventurers facing them, kept in check only by the marksmen who were peppering them with highly accurate arrows from the safety of the dark woods.
“Out of the way, coming through!” Edwin shouted, picking up speed as he charged toward the enemy shield wall. Needing no further convincing, his comrades stepped aside, and a moment later he was crashing into the surprised Marradi soldiers.