Torl looked past his men and spotted the massive figure swathed in white at the centre of the group of priests. 'Gods, that's all I need,' he muttered before raising his voice. 'Sir Dahten, stand your men down.'
A grey-haired hurscal turned to the suzerain and gave him a pained expression. Torl ignored it, so Sir Dahten growled an order to the rest of the bodyguard. None of them dropped their weapons, but they stood less belligerently as the breaking of camp went on around them.
'Chalat, good morning,' Torl called out. The Chetse white-eye didn't immediately respond. His attention appeared to be focused on the other army's camp in the distance. Torl knelt and offered his sword hilt, the Farlan custom. He had not met the former ruler of the Chetse before this campaign, but there were stories aplenty. His appetites were legendary, as was his remarkable physical prowess, but it appeared some of the stories would have to be revised.
'Torl, your men are not performing the morning devotionals.' Chalat said at last, his gaze moving over the assembled hurscals before settling on the suzerain. 'Their lack of piety is a concern for us all. All success depends on the blessing of the Gods.'
Chalat was tall as General Lahk, but far more heavily built than any Farlan. His forearms were as thick as a man's thigh — his recent fasting had done little to reduce them — but where Chalat had once been famously barrel-shaped, now his belly had reduced and he tapered dramatically below his enormous rib-cage, the new shape highlighted by the robe he wore tied at the waist by a length of rope. His face was gaunt, and he had dark rings under his eyes. His hair was silvery grey, rare for a white-eye. Though Chalat had lived far longer than a normal human, until the summer it had been the normal Chetse light brown.
'I do not question their piety, Chalat,' Torl said in a strained voice, 'which cannot be said for some of those who follow you like carrion crows.'
The crows behind fluttered their feathers angrily, but Chalat stilled them with a raised finger. His face showed no emotion — he was at peace with the Land and secure in his purpose. For Suzerain Torl, father to a white-eye and Lord Bahl's confidant for many years, it was a worrying sight. No white-eye at the centre of an army should look that way; it went against everything that drove them.
'They are moths, not crows, and they are flocking to my light,' Chalat intoned solemnly. On his back he still wore the great broadsword he had been given when he became the Fire God's Chosen all those years ago. The Bloodrose amulet that had accompanied it, however, he had given away before leaving Lomin. Torl had laughed when he first heard that, refusing to believe any white-eye would give away an artefact of such power, but Chalat really had: he had been irrevocably changed.
'A white-eye no more,' Torl remembered Chalat saying the day he joined them, 'a lord no more, but envoy of the Qods.'
That's too close to 'prophet' for my liking, and everyone knows they're all mad. Do you think faith will turn spears? he wondered to himself.
'Moths are brainless creatures, soon consumed by the flame,' Torl responded.
Chalat nodded slowly, clearly interested only in the glory itself and not the effect it might have. 'The army must perform the devotionals each morning, the officers alongside their men. The priests shall oversee them and instruct them in the ways of the Gods. There is talk of the godless among us, of creatures that sleep during the day and stalk the camp at night.'
Instruct them in the ways of the Qods? 1 can just imagine what that will mean. Do they really think men will stand by and watch their friends be dragged off?
Torl looked at the priests lingering in the Chetse's shadow, seeing if he recognised any — they changed regularly, which pointed to a savage struggle for supremacy within the clerics of the crusade. Two were priests of Tsatach, still of fighting age, who Chalat had taken as his disciples. The rest were predominantly a mixture from the temples of Nartis and Death, although today there were representatives of Belarannar, Vrest and Vasle in attendance.
'To make the men perform the devotionals en masse would delay us by an hour each day,' Torl protested, 'and that gives the enemy greater time to detect us and prepare.'
'You claim your mages and scryers hide us from his sight. Is this not true?'
'I make no promises; the Chosen of Larat may prove too strong for our mages.' Now you have a use for them? Yesterday you wanted me to hang the lot as heretics, even as they told us where the Menin were!
'In that case they are of no use to us,' Chalat replied simply. 'They shall stand before a Morality Tribunal and account for themselves.'
Torl bowed in what he hoped would look a conciliatory manner. 'I'm afraid they cannot. Lord Isak has already ordered all mages to his army. After the deaths two nights past, he recalled all those with college contracts.'
'They are under my command,' Chalat said, for the first time actually focusing properly on Torl. A spark of the white-eye he had once been flickered in his eyes. 'They are tools of the Gods, to do with as I see fit. Tell the boy to send them back.'
'As you wish,' Torl said, amazed at Chalat's behaviour. The white-eye could not conceive that his order would be refused. Presumably he expected Lord Isak would meekly comply.
The Morality Tribunals were becoming increasingly violent; men were being flogged, sometimes to death, before the sitting priests to obtain confessions, but it was those who survived that Torl felt sorry for. Forced to admit their guilt, denounce their friends and punish their comrades, then ordered to receive 'correction' — Torl wasn't sure those sentenced to death weren't luckier. He had found himself ordering Tiniq to kill to save men from this madness, which was being repeated day after day.
'We are close to the enemy; I can smell their heresy on the wind,' Chalat said, interrupting Torl's grim thoughts.
'We will ride in battle-order this morning,' Torl agreed. 'In four days' hard ride we should have sight of Blackfang. My latest reports have Lord Styrax's forces to be encamped outside Akell'
'I must lead the army.' Chalat looked over towards the other army, seeing the movement there as General Lahk was no doubt urging them to break camp first. 'We will leave before Lord Isak; you may join me, Suzerain Torl.' With that, he turned and left.
Torl watched the priests part to allow him through before neatly peeling around to follow him. Only one remained, a tall man of about thirty summers with a flattened nose, wearing the robes of Nartis. He appeared oblivious to the fact his comrades had already crossed the hurscal line, so intently was he observing Suzerain Torl. The older man didn't recognise him at all, but he guessed he was one of those with magical ability. From what Torl could fathom of the shifting alliances and allegiances within the cults, the prospect of battle had propelled the mages to the fore.
'The envoy of the Gods commands you. You will not need your hurscals. Leave them here.' The priest gave Torl a crooked smile and pointed the way, intending Torl to follow Chalat. 'It is felt you are in need of additional religious instruction.'
'Fuck you and the rest of your zealot cronies!'
Torl blinked. For a moment he thought the words had come from his own mouth until he realised Tiniq had stepped forward, a look of undisguised loathing on his face.
The priest did not appear in the least intimidated. 'Godless scum,' he snarled. 'For that insult to the cults you will face a tribunal, of that I assure you.'
'Go ahead,' Tiniq replied. 'My name is Tiniq; I am brother to General Lahk and a sworn sword of Isak Stormcaller. If you think you can drag me before a tribunal, you are welcome to try.'
The priest's head flicked around back to Torl. 'You keep the company of heretics,' he hissed. 'Your education is in greater need than we had realised. Leave your weapons and follow me.'