Accidental War Mage

I picked Katya up and hugged her until she stopped apologizing. Then I told her she had done well enough, and she smiled. Then I told the baron's butler I would not be returning to dinner, as I needed to attend to the aftermath of the attempted raid. The bandits had been routed quickly, I told him, but there was much to be done. Then I suited action to words and hastened back out into the rain. Yuri followed, unbothered by the rain and eager to play and impatient from having missed my earlier stroll around the compound; Katya, less interested in getting wet, did not, announcing that she really needed to take apart, dry, and clean her rifle thoroughly.

I was cold, wet, hungry, and bone tired – even more than when I had finished the day's work on assembling the fortifications. I got progressively colder, wetter, and hungrier rounding up the men in the rain, making a good count of the dead and injured, and taking care of everything else that needed to be done. I made sure that the bandit leader got the attention of the more sober of our two surgeons, to further the chances he might be in a condition to answer my questions at some point; organized double-strength shifts of sentries for the rest of the night; and finally got the night shift manager of the factory calmed down. Convincing his foremen that we neither required nor wanted their help was another task entirely.

The whole time, the rain continued to fall and the air continued to get colder. When I staggered back up to the mansion, I was too tired to go looking for food. I peeled out of my wet clothes and handed them to an anxious-looking servant, who gave me a towel in exchange. I applied the towel to my still-wet self, then more or less controlled my collapse into bed, burrowing under the covers and next to Katya, who was warm (if somewhat startled by the chill touch of my skin).

She scolded me in some fashion; I cannot recall the words, for my consciousness was already in rapid retreat. She seemed in a better mood when she woke me the next day, perched on top of me with a surprisingly shy smile. After a certain period of time, I discovered that she had brought (or arranged to be brought) breakfast, although it had grown cold after she had finished waking me up. I was hungry enough that even cold scrambled eggs tasted very good.

The bandit leader’s life had not lasted the night. The rain, on the other hand, had; though it was falling more lightly than it had during the night. The handful of bandits who had been captured and survived could provide little of the information I had so wished to gather from the leader; they were local to the area, in the broadest sense of the word “local,” which is to say that they were from elsewhere in Silesia or Moravia. However, none of them claimed to have been with the group for more than a few months.

None of them had previously visited the compound, either, but that was a nearly meaningless piece of information considering the brevity of their membership. For neither the first nor the last time, I spent a brief moment wishing that Katya was less thoroughly deadly. I could hardly fault her for being skilled, particularly as I owed my life to her exemplary skill, but sometimes I felt like the man in the fable of the diligent workmech, standing in the middle of the plowed field that used to be his neighbor's barn.

It was my responsibility to be careful of what I said to her so long as she remained my loyal and dedicated officer, bodyguard, and lover. Blood on her hands would stain mine, at least until such time as she stopped obeying me – at which time my blood would surely stain her hands, as I could not imagine killing her. I wondered if the emperor or his ministers had entertained similar thoughts about my former commander.

In spite of his dubious morality, sanity, and severe case of halitosis, Ognyan was well-known to be deeply loyal and obedient to the crown. At least I had the excuse of love on my side – or was that truly unique? Perhaps someone in Tanais loved Ognyan in such a way, and felt the same deep reluctance to do away with someone who had murdered and would murder yet again.

Not that the bandit leader's death qualified as murder, really – a bandit who has just attempted to rob you is usually considered fair game – but I was reminded of the numerous less justifiable deaths on her hands, such as the partygoers in Dab. I tore myself away from that line of thinking. I had ridden this train of thought before and it led directly to Vitold's complaints about Katya and the inevitable doom of our love affair; unfortunately, I loved her too much to do any of the sensible things Vitold suggested.

Focusing on the positives that might ease my burdened conscience, I told myself that I no longer had any cause to worry that I was taking unfair advantage of the atmosphere of terror created in large part by Katya in Dab. Whatever had inspired the baron to hire me to protect his compound, the money had been wisely spent and I could not possibly classify stopping the bandits as anything but a good deed.

Considering that possibility led me to several others, and the realization that the bandit leader was not the only one who could help me divine answers to my question.

I asked the baron if the compound had been raided before, or any of the bandits we had gathered, living or dead, had ever worked for him or visited the compound under more ordinary circumstances.

To the first question he responded in a definitive negative; to the second, he replied that he wasn't sure, and that I should ask his accountant.

His accountant told me that he recognized the bandit leader (and several other dead men) as having come by to extort money several times, beginning two years ago, the last time being a little more than half a year ago. This was a surprise to me, since the baron had told me that the compound hadn't been attacked before. I returned to the baron with this new insight.

This had a number of effects, both immediate and long-term. The accountant was dismissed from his post and then put to work reconciling the books with the promise of final punishment later. Putting these actions in a different order might have made more sense, because the accountant ended up disappearing into the forest after burning the account books. He may or may not have filled his pockets from the compound’s treasury on the way out.

Captain Felix Rimehammer ended up working overtime pro bono in order to ensure that our pay was successfully accounted for. After that accounting was complete, the baron found an urgent need to travel in order to obtain either a loan or advance payment on the cannons he had been contracted to manufacture; we did not see him for several months. His daughter and her friends continued to come and go.

We didn’t see any local bandits for the rest of our time working for the baron. Presumably, survivors had circulated word that the baron’s foundry was well-defended from attack by bandits. However, it had no defense against curious investors or customers (the distinction escaped me in this particular case).

“Check,” I said, pushing the mech across the board.

“That was a mistake,” Vitold said, interposing his knight between my mech and his emperor.

“Really?” I said. I captured his knight with the mech. “Check again.”

“Yes, really,” he said, frowning at the board. “Would you go get us some refills? My throat feels awfully dry.”

When I returned with full mugs, my mech had been captured by Vitold's mage, which was also putting my own emperor in check. “Ah, I see,” I said, politely not mentioning the inexplicable way in which Vitold’s mage had jumped straight over his pawns. “Well, no point in continuing, I think you have this one. Think the men are ready for inspection yet?”

Vitold shook his head. “You don't see Miss High-and-Mighty around, do you? If the men were ready, she would probably be around here by now.” He was referring to infantry captain. Vitold, at this point, would not address her by name, only as “Captain” or “ma'am” to her face and “Miss High-and-Mighty” when she wasn't around to protest.

“Fair point,” I said. I peered around the pub, carefully. If she was here, I should have noticed the ogre-like corporal I'd put in charge of shepherding my infantry captain. I hadn't heard of any incidents of serious drunkenness on her part after assigning her a minder, but she was still minded to spend most of her off-hours in the pub drinking – just not as much. After a second close look, I was satisfied that she hadn't managed to slip her minder off and go to the pub without him.

I had mixed feelings about telling my men to have their gear in parade condition for tomorrow. When I had been a mechanic in a garrison, I had loathed inspections and being paraded out for senior officers and officials to look over, and here I was now ordering the same thing. Now, I was the senior officer and I had nothing to do at the moment but wait for my subordinates to finish supervising all the cleaning and polishing.

I understood the idea of parade condition better, though; the baron wanted everything in the compound to look very nice when the customer arrived to inspect the first batch of cannons he'd manufactured for them. I, in turn, wanted the baron to feel like he could afford our continued presence; and so I wanted the baron to impress his customers enough to shower money in his direction. Some would then spill over onto us. (And perhaps, I added to myself, whoever wanted the baron to build them cannons would also be hiring mercenaries in the none-too-distant future.)

Remembering how irritating it was to have officers wandering about the barracks offering “helpful” suggestions, I thought that it would be better I made myself scarce until the troops were ready for inspection. It made me feel lazy, though.

“Black or white?” Vitold's voice interrupted my musing. He’d finished setting the board back up.

I looked at his two outstretched fists and tapped the left one.

He took his left hand away and opened his right hand, revealing a black stone. “Black, then. I won't have to trade seats.” Vitold sipped the beer and pushed forward an ivory pawn, signaling the start of a fresh match. “So, then, who do you think the younger Rimehammer's eye is on? He's been getting that sort of distant look, and I won't buy for a minute that the height of our women is putting him off. One of the baron's people, maybe?”

I shrugged, dismissing the question. It was hard enough to concentrate on the game. There were so many other things to think about. My mind was on the baron's mysterious business partners, what might impress them, and what that might do for us; I was carrying on my half (well, more accurately, quarter) of a conversation with Vitold, who was inclined to gossip about... well, everybody else in the officer corps with the exception of Katya, if I thought about it. He'd already made his opinion on the subject of her perfectly clear and offered plenty of advice; and I, in turn, clearly hadn't taken any of that advice.

“So. The baron's daughter,” Vitold paused, moving his knight, but keeping his finger on the piece. “You have to fill me in.”

“What about her?” I asked, guardedly. I looked at the board, and reached out to move my mage.

“Wait, no.” Vitold slipped his knight back and then into a different position, using the knight to pantomime a lewd act with his mage. “I think I'll go here, instead. You ever think about doing that with her?”

“That seems unwise,” I said, in as neutral of a tone of voice as possible, frowning at the offending pieces. “For several reasons.”

“Cute, isn't she?” Vitold replaced his knight back to where he’d moved it, and then pressed his offensive forward by bringing his other knight forward.

“I haven't moved yet,” I pointed out. “Give me a minute, it’s not your turn yet.”

“Well?” Vitold pulled his knight back into place. “Isn't she?”

“I won't argue the point,” I said, castling cautiously. “She is well-formed. And yes, before you say anything, yes, she comes attached to a fair sum of money, isn't crazy, and isn't likely to shoot me in the head.”

“Now, now,” Vitold said. “Why would anyone ever want to shoot you in the head, Colonel Marcus? Surely you aren't bedding down with a psychotic murderess of some kind.” He pushed forward an exposed pawn, transparently baiting me.

I refused to take the bait, steadily moving my left mech into position. I lowered my voice and leaned forward. “Look, in all honesty, I'll admit that describes what I’ve been doing, but…” I sighed deeply, my imagination vivid enough to evoke her familiar scent mingled with the perfume she had started wearing since our stop in Dab. Behind me, I could hear rapidly receding footsteps and a small choked sob.

I froze. The perfume had not been my imagination. I turned sharply. A strand of hair, of a familiar shade of red, lay on the floor behind me, faintly reflecting the sunlight. “Kat-” I started to say, then corrected myself, remembering I was in a very public place. “Leontina!” I called out after the footsteps.

“I didn't say anything about her!” Vitold said, waving his hands. “That was all you!”

I shot him a dark look and chased off outside, in the direction the footsteps had gone, around the pub and to the back wall. “Leontina? Leontina!” I looked around, examining the impressions of boots in the mud. The toes pointed back towards the pub, the heels on the side nearer to the wall. Had I gone the wrong way? The sound had been perfectly clear, and clearly Katya, down to the faint mechanical sounds of her prosthetics.

I followed the footsteps back into the pub, noting several trails leading in, but while I saw several of Katya's bootprints pointing in towards the pub by the entrance, I saw none leading out. I placed my foot next to one of the prints, looking down and sinking it into the mud. Yes, those were definitely Katya's footprints. I could even still smell her, the faint whiff of perfume stirred up but not completely dispersed by my rapid passage and not yet quite washed out of the air by the light drizzle.

Vitold was putting my left mech back on the board. “You knocked over some of the pieces,” he told me, by way of explanation.

I glanced down at the board. I must have been very distracted indeed, for the board looked quite unfamiliar. “Looks like I was losing anyway,” I said. “We'll play again some other time.”

The troops were ready for my inspection near sunset – or perhaps I should say I was ready to inspect them near sunset. This was fortunate, because the baron's business partners arrived early, having taken a train on their own schedule rather than waiting to hitch a ride with the regular supply shipment scheduled for tomorrow. I had wanted to inspect them in their gear the night before the baron's business partners, so we would feel well in order.

As it was, when the baron's customers arrived shortly after I had finished reviewing the troops myself, the troops took as a sign that I had somehow divined their early arrival by uncanny means. This was the latest in a long line of episodes “proving” my supernatural ability to predict the future. Even my decision to keep the men busy building and manning fortifications was taken as a sign of my skill at divining the future – who else had expected bandits to attack?

I'm not entirely sure what the baron himself made of it. He gave me the strangest look as he adjusted his hat, peering at the oncoming carriage. I had told him that sometime around late afternoon, I would be busy reviewing the troops to make sure they were looking their best for tomorrow, so it was not as if he was unaware of my plans or the real reasons for them, but the coincidence of it seemed to strain at his sensibilities.

If anything, he knew that I hadn't had enough foresight to accurately guess how long it would take the infantry to polish their kit or the mechanics to touch up the paint on the mechs. Afternoon had passed into early evening had passed with my attention mainly on the mysterious disappearance of Katya, searching the compound high and low to find where she had gone. (Watching their commanding officer climb up the rooftops and around smokestacks may have presented a distraction to my soldiers.)

Standing at a military parade rest seemed unfamiliar and unnatural. When was the last time I had stood “on parade”? I struggled to remember. It seemed like a lifetime ago. Had we ever been paraded in Wallachia for senior officers? His task force had spent most of its time in the field, and other senior officers had preferred not to spend any more time talking with the general than they had to. I came to the conclusion that the last time must have been before the fateful train ride that had taken me away from that garrison the previous year.

Of the half-dozen people who climbed down from the carriage, I recognized three as having been at the party, their appearance familiar to me. The fourth was unfamiliar in most regards. He was an older man and well-dressed. Among his extensive collection of jewelry, one of his necklaces bore a familiar-looking amethyst pendant. I had often seen its twin hanging around Katya's neck.