TNL 53 – War Part Two
Two and a half weeks later, the good news started piling up. Gareth's study with the blacksmith is going very well and he has made his first attempt at making harnesses. To practice the quality needed for the harnesses, he started with parts of the legs. His third attempt even yielded a shin protection good enough to be used as a spare part.
Furthermore, almost half of the recruits are ready to act as real soldiers. They have received their markings. Where possible, recruits are sent to Fort Alpha and Aran to free up the more experienced troops for the first company, and where necessary recruits are sent to increase the numbers.
Not all the recruits Raidon and Brandon had wanted to send to Aran are going there. The moment these soldiers received their markings, they also received the markings of an acolyte blacksmith priest. Now that they have completed their first training, they must complete a second training period as apprentices with Gareth and Calvus, the old blacksmith.
During this training, the six recruits chosen for this can help in the forge. They can help with operating the bellows and sharpening the knives that Gareth can now make with a decent skill, for example.
For the rest, their training will consist of a lot of reading. Like Gareth, the new acolytes can gain a lot of knowledge from the books. The rest they will learn while practicing under Gareth and Calvus. With eight of them, four of the twelve anvils will eventually be able to be used at the same time.
When the soldiers of the newly established first company arrive in Centurion, Raidon makes a real payroll for this company for the first time. Until now they had a list of the members of the New Legion, but that was along the lines of the regular army. In practice, this set-up means that there is a long list of the names of the warriors or soldiers, including in which army or garrison they serve. On a payroll of the legions there is much more data. From the date of joining to the pay that every soldier should receive.
In Centurion, Raidon has found payrolls of the ancient legions in the library. As a result, it is now finally possible to officially establish the first company of the New Legion. Officially, this is even:
First company of the first regiment of the first legion.
At the moment, however, there is no legion or even a regiment within the New Legion. For the harnesses, however, this does not matter much. Even before the ink on the document is dry, the indications already appear on the armor of the soldiers. On the side of the right shoulder, a large I appears with each soldier, with a smaller I underneath and an even smaller I underneath. For units smaller than a company, there is apparently no special sign for it on the armor.
For Raidon, this is a huge morale boost. Within a year of the creation of the New Legion, it was possible to set up a real company, with two platoons in reserve as well.
When drawing up the payrolls, Raidon notices something else. John, who has been a bit different from the others from the beginning, turns out to have been promoted! Why Raidon hasn't heard anything about this yet, he doesn't know, but it seems like a good idea to bring John to Centurion to perhaps pass on some of his tracking knowledge to the new recruits.
After that, it goes fast. Less than a week and a half later, virtually all recruits are ready to join as soldiers. The best are added to the first company, while the others replace the more experienced soldiers at the other posts where as possible.
Furthermore, it is worth mentioning that Raidon had a strange conversation with John.
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When John received the message from Raidon that he had to report as a squad leader in naval base Centurion, he was not happy.
His mood hasn't gotten much better since then either. Even though he managed to hide his rank during the trip, he doesn't like the fact that Raidon has somehow found out that he has been promoted.
When he arrives in Centurion and is instructed to give training to a group of recruits as a squad leader, he stands his ground.
"Sorry, captain, but it's not without reason that I make sure that nobody knows that I am a squad leader. According to section 71a of the squad leader's handbook, I have the right to conceal my rank, unless this would endanger my unit."
Raidon looks at John in amazement. He has never heard of this.
"Read that part, captain. I am part of the spies and scouts. I can disguise my own rank, in order to gain information that someone with a higher rank could not get."
Raidon picks up the piece in question. After reading through it, he gets up to pick up another handbook.
"Ah, look, now it looks familiar to me again. This piece in the captain's manual already seemed strange to me, but now it's becoming a lot clearer."
"Sorry, Captain? What do you mean?"
"I came across a piece in my handbook that had to do with this. I just could never figure out exactly what it was like. To my knowledge, the harnesses always indicated the right rank, so I had nothing to do with the information I came across here."
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John still doesn't get it.
"I'll explain. You can and may hide your rank, but as leader of the legion I also have something to say about that. Remember, you are ultimately under my command. It would have been better if you had told me this earlier, but knowing you I’m not surprised."
"I can't quite follow you, Captain," John now replies somewhat guiltily.
"I'll tell you. First of all, as I have instructed you, as a squad leader, are going to train a number of recruits."
John wants to go against this, but Raidon doesn't give him that chance.
"Secondly, I want you to choose the best men here, to become part of the unit of spies and scouts."
Now John becomes a bit more thoughtful, but even then he doesn't like to be saddled with a bunch of idiots. Certainly not those shrill males he has seen struggling on their first day in their harness.
"Third, John, you are going to act as my intelligence officer as a disguised sergeant. According to my handbook, I have the right to appoint one of the members of your unit for that officers position, with a promotion to sergeant. So congratulations. However, be wary that from now on you can no longer make your rank seem lower than the rank of squad leader. After all, you have to be able to lead your men."
Still somewhat flustered, John leaves Raidon's office.
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Two days after the first recruits have completed their basic training, the time has come. Raidon is interrupted when he is working on a workout. A messenger is waiting impatiently at the edge of the training field.
"Captain Raidon, Captain Brandon asks if you can come to the staff building as soon as possible. There is a message from Linh."
Raidon doesn't waste a moment. "I'm coming, soldier. Reports captain Brandon that I'll be there in a few minutes."
Once he arrives at the staff building, Brandon starts:
"The enemy has carried out its first attacks. They have made some small attacks on a number of forts. Probably to test how well manned these are. The messenger also indicated that the first units of the army are already retreating. There is little chance that they will wait until there is a real attack."
"Okay, so we have to move there as soon as possible if we want to make a difference. We will need the help of the military to even the odds. If they have already withdrawn everyone, we are going to have a hard time. Have you sent the orders to get first company moving?"
"Yes, they were sent at the same time that I sent the messenger to get you. Within the hour, everyone will be busy with the preparations."
The fact that Brandon was able to issue the orders so quickly has to do with the fact that they had known about the withdrawal of the army for some time. Raidon had Morris leave a messenger in Linh, to get a message as soon as possible. Even though the commander does not want to cooperate with them, they have received the message in record time. The messenger was ordered to leave the moment the first sign of activity with the enemy was seen. If they were waiting for word of an attack on the city itself, they would have never been able to arrive in time. That is why the plans have been ready for a long time and they only get better as more soldiers are added to the roster.
Raidon will take an entire company to Linh to save the city. Brandon keeps the other one hundred soldiers and the recruits without armor with him to man the different locations. Since there are enough new soldiers for these tasks, Raidon is also able to bring a unit of twenty cavalrymen.
Who he doesn't take with him is Duncan. In Raidon's original plan, Duncan would go with the company to provide support in the form of weapons of war such as ballista’s. Duncan himself has indicated that this is not possible. He doesn't have any other engineers to help him with those. He will have to train a unit of ten to twenty men and teach them how to handle things like catapults. Because that is not possible within a few day, it makes little sense to take him to the front. He'd be of better use to stay in Centurion to train those people and to take care of all the other things needed in the naval base.
Since the call had been expected for some time, most of the supplies have already been loaded onto the ship. Only food and fresh water still need to be loaded. This takes about an hour and that is also the time it takes the soldiers to get ready. Once everything and everyone is ready, they board and leave.
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When Captain Cervik enters her office, Alyena immediately sees that he doesn’t bring good news.
"You look as gloomy as the weather outside, Cervik. What went wrong this time? Or do you have another pimple on your back?" Alyena tries to lighten the mood while it is still possible.
"If only it were so, your majesty. The news is much grimmer. General Dwain has just reported that the moment we feared has come true. Chakra has carried out another attack, this time in the south. Where they get the men from, I don't know, but although they have a huge army in the north, they attacked the forts on the border with a second army. According to General Dwain, several forts are under siege and it is only a matter of time before they break through and take the city of Linh. When he passed on the message, it was only a few days old. The messenger often changed horses so that we could hear this news as soon as possible."
"Damnit! How do they do it? Both our countries have always been equals. Even if they dealt us a heavy blow with that surprise attack a year ago, we should at least have been able to hold out after we had strengthened the border. And now you tell me they still have another army? Or is this even bigger than the one in the north?"
"What I've heard from the general is that this army is a lot smaller, your majesty. At most thirty thousand warriors. Yet it consists of more troops than we have stationed there. The generals, as you know, emptied out almost every garrison of trained men to reinforce the army in the north. As a result, not only the forts in the south are undermanned, but also all other garrisons in the country.
The only place where, according to General Dwain, we can hold out is far inland. This new border lies on the narrowest piece of land between the Ancient Forest and the wilderness. The Ancient Forest has always been an impenetrable place and the wilderness is not much more passable. They won't be able to get armies through that without us knowing."
Alyena quickly walks up to the large map that hangs on one of the walls of her office.
"You mean this place?" asks Alyena, pointing her finger at the spot.
"Yes, your majesty."
"But then we would give away almost a quarter of the empire! That piece of land is even bigger than what we lost last year!"
"I know, but apparently at the moment we don't have enough warriors to stop Chakra's armies. I know this is costing us a lot of revenue, but if we take away enough troops from of the north to counter this attack, we run the risk of them breaking through there. If that happens, we could even lose the capital."
"I'm not concerned with money," Alyena dismisses the captain's comment, "I'm concerned with all the people who live there. We now know what Emperor Borya does to his subjects, not much good will happen to those people. If we do nothing, we will lose not only Linh, but also all the other villages and towns in that area. That's thousands of people!"
"Yes, your majesty, but there is nothing we can do. What we do need to do is try to limit the damage. The people must try to escape, and you must ensure that our secret project does not destroy itself."
"You're right. If the New Legion tries to save the border, we will lose them too. Our only chance is to grow the New Legion until they are strong enough to save our empire. They've had almost a year now and in that time they've already achieved a lot, who knows what they can do if they have another year."
Deeply saddened, Alyena signs the order that the New Legion must stay absent from the fighting in the south.