Chin stalked them for six weeks. The party declined to six as the hunters caught a man here, a man there. Chiang went, victim of a brief, foredoomed exchange with Lord Chin. He didn’t choose to go. Surprised, in despair, he fought the only way he knew.
His passing allowed the others to escape.
In the end there were Tam, Lang, Tran, Kwang, Lo, and another old veteran from the Seventeenth. They hid in caves in the Upper Mahai. Their stay lasted a year.
Men drifted to the Mahai, to O Shing. The first were regular soldiers from legions torn by the conflicting loyalties of their officers. Later, there were Citizens and peasants, fleeing homes and cities ruined by the Demon Princess’s attacks.
Lord Wu, though far from Mist’s match in the Power, won a reputation as a devil. Her chief Tervola, Chin, could defeat but never destroy him.
O Shing gave the recruits to Tran to command.
Tran played guerrilla games with them. His tactics were unorthodox and effective. Much enemy blood stained the rocky Mahai.
Tam learned to keep moving, to be where his foes least expected him. He learned to command. He learned to stand by his own judgment and will. He learned to trust his intuitions, Tran’s military judgments, and Lang’s assessments of character.
In the crucible of that nightstalk he learned to control and wield his awesome grasp of the Power.
He learned to survive in an inimical world.
He
became
O Shing.
Mist’s attempts to hunt him down became half-hearted, though. Overconfident of her grip on Shinsan, sure time would bring the collapse of the eastern faction, she and her Tervola became embroiled in foreign adventures. Greedily, her Tervola devoured small states all round Shinsan’s borders.
It was a different Shinsan without the balance and guidance of the Princes Thaumaturge. Everything speeded up. Patience and perseverance gave way to haste and greed. Old ways of doing, thinking, believing, collapsed.
In one year six men became thirty thousand. More than the barren Mahai could support. Peasants and Citizens received war-training in their Prince’s struggle to stay alive.
“It’s time to move,” Tam told his staff one morning. He seemed almost comical, commanding captains ages older than he. “We’ll go to the forest of Mienming. It’s more suited to Tran’s war style.”
Lord Chin was adapting. He was using a semisentient bat to locate and track Tran’s raiders. Food could be stolen but concealment could not.
The old sorcerers returned to their commands and prepared for the thousand-mile march. No one questioned O Shing’s wisdom.
Mist’s troops met them at the edge of the Mahai. Skirmishing continued throughout the long march. A third of O Shing’s army perished forcing a crossing of the Taofu at Yaan Chi, in the Tsuyung Hills. For three days the battle raged. Sorceries murdered the hills, and it seemed, toward the end, that O Shing would become one with the past, that his gamble had failed.
Tam redoubled his stakes, raising hell creatures few Tervola dared summon.
Mist’s army collapsed.
Eyebrows rose behind a hundred hideous masks as the news spread. Chin defeated? By a child and a woodsman untrained in the arts of war? Six legions overwhelmed by half-trained peasants scantily backboned by the leavings of shattered legions?
The Tervola weren’t bemused by Yo Hsi’s daughter. They didn’t enjoy being ruled by a woman. Quiet little missions penetrated the Mienming. This Tervola or that offered to slip the moorings of a hasty alliance if O Shing dealt her another outstanding defeat.
Seizing power wasn’t the lodestone of Tam’s life. Survival was the stake he had on the table. Chin was a tireless hunter.
O Shing was still in hunted-beast mind-set when Wu reentered his life.
Mist’s Tervola had coaxed her into invading Escalon. Escalon was no impotent buffer state. The neutralist Tervola, constituting most of their class, joined the venture. Expansion was ancient national policy.
They weren’t pleased with the war’s conduct. Escalon was strong and stubborn. Mist had no feel for imaginative strategy. Her angry hammer blows consumed legions.
In Shinsan soldiers weren’t, as elsewhere, considered fodder for the Reaper. Tervola loved spending men like a miser loved squandering his fortune. Two decades went into preparing a soldier. Quality replacements couldn’t be conjured from beyond the barrier of time.
Divining future trouble, they had begun training enlarged drafts years ago, but those wouldn’t be ready for a decade.
Their wealth and strength were being squandered.
They simmered with rebellious potential.
Wu and Feng wanted to take advantage.
“No!” Tam protested. “I’m not ready.”
“We
aren’t ready,” Tran growled. “You’ll waste what little we’ve husbanded.”
“It’s now or never,” Feng snarled.
Lord Wu tried persuasion. And O Shing acquiesced, overawed by Wu’s age and ancient wisdom.
Tran got to choose the time.
Most of Escalon and a tenth of Shinsan lay under the shadow, terror, and destruction of Mist’s assault on the Monitor and Tatarian, Escalon’s capital. Lo led Tran’s best fighters through the transfer…
O Shing followed minutes later. Mist had fled. Want it or not, he had inherited a war. The legions were in disarray. Tervola were demanding orders. He had no time to think. With Tran’s help he battled the Monitor to a draw.
Afterward, Tran muttered, “We haven’t gained anything. We’re on the bull’s-eye now, Tam.” He indicated Wu and Feng, who were celebrating with small cups of Escalonian wine.
“Drink,” Feng urged, offering Tam a cup. The professional grouch was radiant. “They say it’s the world’s finest wine.”
“Sorry,” Tam mumbled. This was the first time he had seen Feng without his mask. He was as ugly in fact as spirit. At one time fire had ravaged half his face. He hadn’t fixed it. Tam feared that said something about the man within.
“Celebration’s premature,” Tran grumbled. “Somebody better stay sober.”
O Shing’s reign lasted a month.
Mist did as she had been done. Her shock troops transferred through during the height of a battle.
In the Mienming, Tam sat in the mud cradling Lo’s head. The centurion was almost gone.
“This is the price of our lives,” Tam hissed. Wu, maskless, moist of eye, knelt beside the man who, possibly, had been his one true friend. “Was a month worth it?”
Wu just held Lo’s hand.
The centurion had fought like a trapped tiger. His ferocity had allowed O Shing, Wu, Feng, and the others to escape.
“No more, Wu,” said Tam. He spoke in a tone suited to his title. “I’ve seen children more responsible. Amongst the forest people you despise.” He indicated Tran, sitting alone, head between his knees. He and Lo had grown close.
“What’ll satisfy you? All our deaths? This time Lo and Kwang. Next time? Tran? My brother? If you persist, I promise I’ll be the last. After you, My Lord.”
Wu met his gaze, recoiled.
Neither he nor Chin seemed able to learn. They bushwhacked one another repeatedly. Chin finally got the upper hand.
O Shing remained in Mienming nursing his grudge against Tervola.
Mist completed her Escalonian adventure. Success stabilized her position, though not solidly. Her sex, the casualties, and her failure to capture the Tear of Mimizan remained liabilities.
O Shing first heard of the Tear from Wu. Wu wasn’t sure what it was, just that it was important. It was the talisman which had made possible the Monitor’s prolonged defense of Tatarian.
“It’s one of the Poles of Power,” Feng opined.
“Bah!” Wu replied. “Monitor’s propaganda. There’s no proof.”
The Poles were legendary amongst the thaumaturgic cognoscenti. One, supposedly, was possessed by the Star Rider. The second had been missing for ages. Even the hi
ghest wizards had nearly forgotten it. During the recent conflict the Monitor had hinted that the Tear was the lost Pole.
Every sorcerer living would have bartered his soul to possess a Pole. The man who mastered one could rule the world.
In time, sensing the restlessness of the Tervola, Mist looked for another foe to divert them. She took up a program inherited from her father, which she had quietly nurtured since her ascension.
O Shing spent ever more time alone, or with Tran and Lang. Only those two still treated him as Tam. Only they considered him as more than a means to an end.
Lo’s death cost Wu O Shing’s love and respect.
Wu was changing. No one called him “the Compassionate” now. A poisonous greed, a demanding haste, had crept into his soul.
And O Shing was changing too, becoming cynical and disenchanted.
The man in the cat-gargoyle mask made his first presentation to the Pracchia. Nervously, he said, “Mist plans to invade the west now. She’s suborned the Captal of Savernake. Maisak, the fortress controlling the Savernake Gap, will be Shinsan’s. Ehelebe-in-Shinsan can assume control of the invasion whenever the Pracchia directs. We have moved with care, into leading positions in both political factions. I have become Mist’s chief Tervola. Members of my Nine are close to the Dragon Prince. We still recommend that nominal rule be invested in the latter. He remains the more manageable personality.” He detailed plans for eliminating Mist and making O Shing the Pracchia’s puppet.
“Absolutely perfect,” said he who was first in the Pracchia. “By all means encourage Mist’s plans. She’ll take care of herself for us.”
O Shing, Lang, and Tran watched the commandos disappear. O Shing still shivered with the strain of a recently completed sorcery. Mist and the Captal certainly would be diverted.
“Why’re we here, Tran?” he whispered.
“Destiny, Tam. There’s no escape. We must be what we must be. How many of us like it? Even forest hunters ask the same question.”
O Shing met Wu’s eye. Lord Wu was in disguise. He wore no mask. His expression was taut, pallid, frightened.
Lang whispered, “Friend Wu is spooked.” Lang took tremendous pleasure in seeing the mighty discomfited, perhaps because it brought them nearer his own insignificance. “That thing you called up… He wasn’t looking for that.”
“The Gosik of Aubochon? I was just showing off.”
“You scared the skirts off him,” Tran said. “He’s having second thoughts about us.”
Wu was frightened. Not even the Princes Thaumaturge, at the height of their Power, had dared call that devil from its hell. And, though O Shing hadn’t gone quite that far himself, he
had
opened a portal through which the monster could cast a shadow of itself, a doorway through which it might burst if O Shing’s Power weren’t sufficient to confine it.
Wu wasn’t certain whether O Shing had overestimated himself or was genuinely able to control the devil. Either way, he had trouble. If the Gosik broke loose, the world would become its plaything. If O Shing truly commanded it, the Dragon Prince was more powerful than anyone had suspected, and had trained himself quietly and well. Those who intended using him might find the tables turning.
Worse, the youth was winning allegiances outside the Tervola. He was popular with the Aspirants. This sudden Power might tempt him to replace Tervola with Aspirants he trusted.
But it was too late to change plans. Rectifications had to wait till Mist had been destroyed.
Wu felt like a man who bent to catch a king snake and discovered that he had hold of a cobra.
News filtered back. Mist had been completely surprised. Only a handful of supporters, all westerners, were with her. Tran’s commandos were occupying Maisak. The woman would be theirs soon.
The same promises were still coming through two days later. The lives of Tervola had been lost, and the survivors kept saying, “Soon.”
“This’ll never end,” Tam told Lang while awaiting their turn to transfer. “She’ll get away. Just like we always did. There must be a reason.”
Tran had been sitting silently, lost in thought. “May I hazard a guess?”
“Go ahead.”
“I think there’re other plots afoot. One catches things here and there if one listens.”
“They’d
let
her get away?”
“Maybe. I’m not sure. She’s smart and strong. Whatever, there’s something happening. We’d best guard our backs.”
O Shing would remember that later, when Wu brought Lord Chin to swear fealty.
Tam remembered escaping Mist’s hunter almost miraculously. He graciously accepted Chin’s oath, then became thoughtful. Tran was right.
He told Tran and Lang to be observant. No conspiracy could operate without leaving
some
tracks.
The battle at Baxendala upset everyone.
The preliminaries proceeded favorably enough. Chin assumed tactical command, quickly drove the westerners into their defense works. Then he had no choice but frontal attack. Nobody worried. The westerners were a mixed lot, from a half-dozen states, politically enmired, commanded by a man with little large-scale experience, and already had shown poorly against the legions. They would punch through.
The battle, as Shinsan’s did, opened with a wizards’ skirmish. O Shing, emboldened by Wu’s reaction earlier, conjured the Gosik himself…
A bent old man, high above the battlefield, became enraged. This wasn’t in his plan. He took steps, knowing the result might delay his ends.
But O Shing was becoming dangerous. He was outside the control of Ehelebe-in-Shinsan…
He ended the efficacy of the Power, using his Pole of Power, which had the form of a gold medallion.
The cessation of the Power rattled O Shing. His Tervola were dismayed. Never had they known the Power to fail.
“We retain our advantages,” Chin argued. “They’re still weak and disunited. We’ll slaughter them.” His confidence was absolute.
Chin’s prediction seemed valid initially. The westerners were stubborn, but no match for the legions. Their lines crumbled…
Yet Tam couldn’t shake a premonition of disaster.
Tran felt it, too. And acted. He ordered O Shing’s bodyguard to be ready.
Then it happened. Western knights exploded from a flank long thought secured by local allies. They hit the reserve legion before anyone realized they weren’t friendly.
The soldiers of Shinsan had never encountered knights. They stood and fought, and died, as they had been taught—to little real purpose.
Chin panicked. It communicated itself to O Shing.
“Stand fast!” Tran begged. “It’ll cost, but we’ll hold. They won’t break.”
Nobody listened. Not even the youth who had vowed to respect Tran’s advice above all others’.
The horsemen turned on the legions clearing Ragnarson’s defense works. Chin and Wu cried disaster.
Tran cajoled and bullied enough to prevent a rout.
That night O Shing ordered a withdrawal.
“What?” Tran demanded. “Where to?”
“Maisak. We’ll retain control of the pass, transfer more men through, resume the offensive.” He parroted Chin. “The Imperial Standard will remain here.” His lips were taut. He hated that sacrifice. The legion would be lost if reinforcements didn’t arrive in time.
“Stand here,” Tran urged again.
“We’re beaten.”
Tran gave up. When O Shing’s ear went deaf there was no point in talking on.
Maisak greeted them with arrows instead of paeans for its overlord.
The King Without a Throne had gotten there first.
Chin blew up. Never had soldiers of Shinsan been so humiliated.
“Attack!” he shrieked. “Kill them all!”
O Shing ignored Tran again.
The assault cost so many lives, uselessly, that Chin’s standi
ng with the Tervola plummeted. They wouldn’t listen to him for years.
Tervola also questioned O Shing’s acceding to Chin’s folly when the barbarian, Tran, had foreseen the outcome…
After that secondary defeat O Shing put his trust in Tran again. The hunter guided the survivors across the wilderness, through terrible hardships. Two thousand men reached Shinsan. Of twenty-five thousand.
The western adventure, so optimistically begun, traumatized O Shing. The bitter trek across the steppes renewed his acquaintance with fear. Three times he had endured the fleeing terror: with the Han Chin, ducking Mist, and now escaping the west.
He wanted no more of it.
The terrors would shape all his policies as master of Shinsan.
That much he had gained. Mist had been beaten. She resided with the enemy now, lending her knowledge to theirs.
He became a dedicated isolationist. Unfortunately, the Tervola didn’t see it his way.
E
LEVEN:
S
PRING, 1011 AFE
M
ARSHALL AND
Q
UEEN
Ragnarson’s party reached Karak Strabger at midnight. Bragi grumbled about the castle’s disrepair. It hadn’t seen maintenance since the civil war. Something needed doing. Baxendala was crucial to Kavelin’s defense.
Fortifications were like women past thirty. They required constant attention or quickly fell apart.
He gave his mount to one of the tiny garrison, glanced at Varthlokkur.
“Not time yet. She’s resting. We have a day.”
“I’ll go see her. For a minute. Ragnar, stay with Mr. Eldred. The duty corporal will find you someplace to sleep.”
“I need it,” Ragnar replied. A shadow crossed his brow.
“I’ll be down in a minute.” He hugged his son. They had lost a lot, and had had too much time to remember while riding.
Ragnarson wasn’t a demonstrative man. His hug startled Ragnar, but clearly pleased him. “Go on. And behave. Everybody in the army has permission to wax your ass if you act up.”
It was a long climb. Gjerdrum and Dr. Wachtel had wanted Fiana inaccessible.