Upon announcement of this last enormity of senselessness, two of Bralos’ troop-lieutenants sought words with the captain upon behalf of married sergeants whose wives lived in the peripheries of the camp, and after hearing them out, Bralos called for a horse and rode over to Senior Captain Thoheeks Portos’ headquarters.
But seeing the brigade commander took much more waiting than was at all usual, and when at last he was ushered in and had stated his case, the harried-looking senior captain just shook his head, brusquely, and barked, “Dammit, Bralos, we have to do it because the Grand Strahteegos says we have to do it. If the old man truly considers you and yours to be mercenaries, however, you just might be able to get by with ignoring most of these insanities; Guhsz Hehluh intends to do just that and so, too, do all of the Horseclansmen, the artificiers and the eeahtrohsee, I understand.”
“And you, my lord Senior Captain Thoheeks?” asked Bralos. “Your heavy cavalry are as much on loan to this state and this army as are the units commanded by Captains Guhsz Hehluh and Pawl of Vawn, truth to be told. Have you the intention of submitting your officers and troopers to such injustices?”
Portos squirmed his body uneasily. “Let’s … let us just say that I intend to look out for the welfare of my subordinates wherever and whenever and in every conceivable way possible, Captain Vahrohnos Bralos, as always in times past has been my wont. Such is always a good practice for any officer of rank—from the very highest to the lowest—to follow, I might add. However, an astute officer, one who makes survival a habit, will recognize superior force and bow to it … if it all comes down to that. As in battle, if faced with impossible odds and with maneuver impossible or pointless, you have but two options, in reality: withdrawal or suicide.
“And now, my good Bralos, I have no more time for you, unless you have other, meaningful business to broach. Preparing both my own squadron and the brigade for the march would be more than enough to occupy all my waking hours, without this other exercise in stupidity, atop all else.”
Bralos formally saluted, turned about and departed. He understood, he understood fully. It was but another playing of the ancient military game: guard your arse and duck your head. He would just have to take to sending out the two married sergeants, the three other sergeants who maintained more or less formal “arrangements” with women and the lieutenant who had married the daughter of a merchant of the lower town as a “detail” each evening and having Keemohsahbis, the vintner, bring in his carts enough potables for the entire squadron; such was, he decided, the only sane course to follow in this lunatic war that the Grand Strahteegos seemingly had declared upon his own command. And this was just what he told Captain-of-squadron Chief Pawl Vawn of Vawn when that worthy came riding over that night.
Sloshing the brandied wine about in his cup, the spare, wiry chief remarked, “You know, Bralos, I liked—I really liked—that old man on first meeting and for a long time since, but after all I’ve seen and heard since you and me and our men got back from this latest campaign up north, I’m beginning to wonder if the old bastard hasn’t traded in all of his brains for a peck of moldy owlshit or something.
“None of this latest shit, not one particle of it, makes any sense at all, you know. He’s halved the pay of them as are still getting paid, says it’s going to be saved against their retirements. He says, too, that all loot taken in the future has to go to the army—him, in other words—and that he’ll see any man as tries to hold out anything looted well striped the first time and hung the next time, no matter what his rank. He has offered an amnesty to any officer or common soldier who took loot and kept it for himself in the past if he now will turn what is left of the worth of that loot over to the Grand Strahteegos.”
Bralos felt a cold chill run the length of his spine, felt the hairs of his nape all aprickle. “Where did you get this information, Pawl?” he demanded.
The Horseclans chief shrugged. “Part of the shit that was laid down while we was gone, is all, Bralos. Sub-chief Myk, who led the rest of my squadron while we were gone up north, told me about it, and I hunted out the copy of the order from the pile; you’ve got a copy too, I’d guess, somewhere in your headquarters. You worried about that Yvuhz dagger you took off them bandits, man? Hell, damn few knows about it, anyway, so just pry out the stones, cover the gold hilt with soft leather and brass wire and forget about it, that’s what I’d do.”
“Fuck that dagger!” snarled Bralos. “Were that all of it, I’d give our overly acquisitive Grand Strahteegos that deadly little bauble in a trice and never again think about it.”
“Then what?” asked Chief Pawl, looking puzzled.
Bralos sighed. “Strictly speaking—and I’m dead certain that we had best expect everything to be interpreted in the strictest of terms by our commander in future—the windfall that has established my own fortune could be considered loot.”
“No such thing,” declared Paw! vehemently. “I wasn’t there, then, but I heard about it all from not a few as were. You were given the effects of that slimeball Hahkmukos as suffering-price and loss-price. When informed of how much more you’d found squirreled away in that campaign chest, I’ve been told, old Thoheeks Grahvos had him a good belly-laugh and said that it was a good thing to have such lucky officers in any army.”
“Even so,” said Bralos soberly, “I think that I had best consider that the Grand Strahteegos, who has seemed to resent my affluence ever since I managed to buy a squadron, and maybe even before that, has definite designs upon my gold and my lands. I think I had best seek audience with Sub-strahteegos Tomos. Maybe with Thoheeks Grahvos, too, for that matter. Have you the time to ride along with me, Pawl?”
After conferring with Bralos and hearing out all his worries and baleful presentiments, Sub-strahteegos Thoheeks Tomos Gonsalos sent a galloper with a sealed message tube into Mehseepolis, to the palace of Council. Bralos followed shortly with Chief Pawl, their two sets of personal guards and a heavy weight of golden Zenos.
Thoheeks Grahvos and Thoheeks Mahvros received the two cavalry officers warmly in Grahvos’ high-ceilinged, airy office, offering a fine wine to wash the dust from their throats and even sending orders that their guards be entertained in the quarters of the Council Guardsmen. Patiently, the two always-busy noblemen listened with clear concentration and patent interest to all that Bralos and Chief Pawl had to tell them. Then Thoheeks Grahvos spoke.
“Gentlemen, did I not know better, know just how much he has done for our Consolidated Thoheekseeahnee since first he came to us, I might think that Thoheeks Pahvlos has taken it into his head to truly destroy this army of ours, drive the best elements from its ranks, certainly, and possibly instigate full mutiny.
“First, that very disturbing report, the other day, from Thoheeks Portos, and now this—it’s all enough to give me more gray hairs at the very thought of what may very well be bubbling away in the minds of the men he’s abusing and denying the few simple pleasures that they have certainly earned by way of superlative service to Council’s army, many times over.