Turning the Storm (6 page)

Someone shouted a welcome, and this cheer was taken up, raggedly, by the refugees. I shouted a greeting back, then wheeled my horse to speak. “We came here expecting a fight,” I said. “I guess we can't complain too much that the soldiers didn't have the stomach to face us.”

The Lupi cheered that; the refugees joined in, but feebly. Their eyes were desperate, hungry, like the eyes of the refugees at Chira, like the eyes of everyone I'd seen in every camp we'd liberated. “From here, we ride north,” I said. “The soldiers were our keepers, but it was the Circle who enslaved us—who created the wasteland, killed our families, imprisoned us here. We are going to sweep in on the Circle as we swept into the wasteland camps—like fire, like the tide, like the incoming storm. If you would join us, be ready to march at dawn tomorrow!”

Smoke still rose from the stone hulk of the keep. The retreating camp soldiers had loaded up what they could carry, and torched everything else. Including all the food. The refugees had stayed where they were in part because they were too weak to flee the wasteland and they hoped that the Lupi would bring them something to eat. After inspecting the ruins of the keep, I
sent for Rafi to arrange for a meal for both the Lupi and the refugees.

Giovanni rode up next to me. “No grain,” he said. “That's not good.”

“It means that wintering in the wasteland is definitely not an option,” I said.

Giovanni opened his mouth, as if he were going to restart the argument over our next course of action, but he thought the better of it. “We can't leave before tomorrow. Let's talk about it after we eat.”

Felice was helping to serve the food when I arrived for my portion. He almost looked like one of the Lupi now—he was dirty, at least. He saluted and then served me some porridge. “Council meeting later,” I said. “Be there. I want someone on my side.” He smiled and nodded.

Giovanni also spent his time before the meeting marshalling allies. When I stepped into the tent, not only Felice but Isabella, Giovanni, and Rafi waited for me. Lucia followed a moment later. I sent for tea for all of us and sat down, waiting for the onslaught.

It started with Rafi. “I think you should disband the Lupi,” he said.

This wasn't what Giovanni had expected him to say, either—that was obvious. “What?” Giovanni said. “What would be the point of that, exactly?”

“You don't know how to fight magefire,” Rafi said. “Neither do I. Neither does Eliana. That's why you've been arguing for the last month over what to do next.”

“So you think we should just give up?” I said.

“What would be the purpose in riding out of the wasteland, just so that we could all be killed?”

During the war with Vesuvia, opposing mages stood
at either end of the battlefield, hurling lethal fire back and forth. The armies were mainly there to keep the other side's swordsmen from walking up and skewering the mages. Of course, some skirmishes were fought without magical support, but on those occasions when one side had mages and the other side did not, the battles were typically over
very
quickly. We had no mages in our army—and for obvious reasons, we were not likely to get any. But just giving up and going home— not that most of us
had
homes—was absurd. “We're not disbanding, Rafi.”

“So how do you plan to face the Circle?” Rafi asked.

“Use the land for protection,” I said. “Strike from under shelter, preferably from behind. The Circle won't move against us all at once. If we draw them out a handful at a time, I think we'll have a chance.”

“How many mages destroyed your village?” Rafi asked.

I felt a flush rise to my cheeks, and a lump rise to my throat. “I don't know.”

“It wasn't many, though.”

“Probably not. But Doratura was not an army; they were not prepared.”

Rafi spread his hands. “Granted. So how do you propose to draw out the Circle?”

“I think we should take some tempting targets,” I said. “Pluma, for one. We could fortify the town …”

“Pluma is a
stupid
target,” Giovanni said.

“It's walled,” I said.

“Walls don't stop magefire! If we're going to draw out the Circle, which I still think is a stupid idea, we should send one of the units to fortify a hilltop. An uninhabited hilltop.”

“In other words, you want to set up some of our
people
as decoys?”

“Why is this a problem?
All
armies do this. What kind of generale are you?”

“The kind who stands
by
her people,” I said, “and doesn't set them up to get
slaughtered
.”

“You could make it a small unit,” he said. “You could even ask for volunteers.”

“No,” I said, “and that's the
end
of it.”

Isabella leaned forward. “Giovanni may be an arrogant twit, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't take advantage of his strategic ability. And in this case he happens to be right.”

“What if it was your unit I sent to be the decoy?” I asked.

“That would be stupid,” Isabella said. “One of the less-experienced units would make more sense.” I opened my mouth in fury and she cut me off. “
But
, if you did send us, we would go because that's a
strategy
that makes sense.”

“I won't use my people that way,” I said.

Vitale arrived with the tea and we all paused to sip and glower at each other.

“We should split up the army,” Giovanni said. “Divide it up into its units and have each one make its own way to Cuore. If we keep the Lupi together, one bad skirmish could wipe out the entire army.”

“The whole purpose of this,” I said through clenched teeth, “is to get them to divide
their
forces. You want us to make the same mistake?”

“Our strength is in numbers?” Giovanni taunted.

“Don't compare me to Beneto,” I said. “If anyone here is acting like Beneto, it's you. He viewed our lives
as worthless, and you're acting as if you see them the same way.”

“That's not true and you know it,” Giovanni said. “You act as if you don't trust your own seconds.”

I ducked my head to take a sip of tea, and Giovanni slammed his own tea down. “That's it, isn't it? You don't trust your seconds to lead the units up to Cuore without you.”

My face was hot; I wished Isabella, at least, were somewhere else. “Half of the commanders can't even divide up the undesirable chores without a brawl erupting.”

“But most of their fights are with other units,” Giovanni said. “They get on well
within
each unit.”

I glanced toward Felice, who hurriedly set down his tea. “I agree with Eliana,” he said.

“About
what
, exactly?” Giovanni said.

“I think we should keep the Lupi together,” Felice said. “As for Pluma—maybe it would help if we had some additional intelligence. The best information we've gotten in months was in those letters Demetrio had in his study. We need to know where the winds are blowing
now
—whether the residents of Pluma will support us or fight against us, whether people view our cause as just or cursed.” Felice picked his tea back up. “Send Camilla, me, and maybe Tomas up to Pluma. I can talk to the reformers there and we can bring back some
current
information. If we ride, we could be there and back in less than two weeks; the food will hold out that long. Meanwhile, you can move the Lupi toward the center of Verdia, where you can strike out toward Pluma if you decide that's best.”

I looked around the tent. Giovanni reluctantly nodded. “More information might help us.”

Isabella was still glaring at me. “It won't change the fact that it's a bad idea to keep the Lupi together.”

“We'll send Felice, Camilla, and Tomas,” I said. “We can discuss this again when they get back.” I turned to Felice. “You'll leave at dawn.”

∗    ∗    ∗

We moved the Lupi, along with our newest recruits from that last camp, to the edge of the wasteland while our scouts were gone. They returned well fed but not terribly well rested. Camilla brought back a small sack of apples, which I shared out among all of us as she gave her report. They were crisp and sweet; I savored my portion and licked the last of the juice from my fingers.

“They're singing your songs,” Camilla said with a wry grin. “Tomas and I went around to different taverns, trying to get a sense of how people felt about the Lupi. They're singing Lia's ballads everywhere.”

“During the war with Vesuvia, there was a battle outside Pluma,” Tomas said. “Things don't grow well there; in a sense, they're in their own little wasteland. They definitely know about the Circle's secret now, and they're angry.”

“And they like
you
,” Camilla said.

“That's good news,” I said. At least it was good news for me; Giovanni didn't look quite so pleased.

“What did you learn from the reformers?” Giovanni asked Felice.

“Apparently the Circle has almost entirely withdrawn to Cuore,” Felice said. “The reformers believe that the Circle is planning to sit tight and wait to see just what the Lupi do. If you want to strike at a large target like Pluma, there's no better time.”

Giovanni scowled. “What did Cilo think?”

“Cilo agrees that the timing is right for the Lupi to strike out of the wasteland.”

“I don't believe it,” Giovanni said. “Cilo
never
thinks it's the right time to act.”

Felice gave him a sheepish grin. “Well, I was doing a little interpretation, because you're right, of course. But he sounded more positive about action than I've ever heard before—and coming from Cilo, that's really something.”

Giovanni sighed deeply, out of arguments.

“What about those letters?” Isabella asked. “Last we heard, the Circle was planning to pounce on us as soon as we left the wasteland, because they couldn't hit us while we stayed down here. What happened to that plan?”

“I couldn't tell you,” Felice said. “I don't think the reformers know. But for now at least, they've pulled back to Cuore.”

“We leave the day after tomorrow,” I said.

∗    ∗    ∗

It didn't quite happen that way. The next morning, there was an outbreak of dysentery among the Lupi. It had started with the weakened refugees from that last camp. Many of them were already ill when we freed them. The morning after Felice, Camilla, and Tomas returned, scores more fell sick, and by morning on the day we'd planned to ride out, half my army was seriously ill. There isn't much you can do for dysentery but wait it out. Most of the Lupi were reasonably healthy after a summer of constant travel and reasonable rations, so I expected most to pull through, but an army that's up to its knees in runny shit is not exactly a fit
fighting force. We'd have to wait until the worst of the illness was past.

I was not among the ones taken ill; I've always had a stomach of cast iron. Giovanni apparently did too, as he also stayed healthy. Lucia was struck down, though, and I spent a few days nursing her, giving her sips of cooled tea in between bullying the healthy Lupi into digging fresh latrines and covering over the filthy ones. We lost about two weeks to the illness. I'd have waited longer, but I'd seen our food stores and knew that we were almost out of time.

Still, as a concession to Giovanni's fears, as well as to the weakness of some of the Lupi who were only just beginning to recover, I left a detachment behind in the wasteland, under Tomas's leadership. This made an excellent excuse to keep Vitale, the youngest of the Lupi, out of danger. I decided that Felice could stay there, too. Though he had been a surprisingly patient teacher, and useful in councils, he had yet to make himself useful during an actual battle. And he'd had a particularly bad case of dysentery. The wasteland detachment could join us in Pluma once we'd secured the town, and at Giovanni's insistence, I agreed that we'd discuss dividing our army at that point. I wanted my troops to have a real victory under their belt, a real accomplishment. After two weeks shitting in the mud, we needed something to lift morale.

As we rode north, the land came back to life even as the plants were dying for the winter. The weeds were brown, the flowers gone to seed; we could let the horses forage now, which eased the burden on our food stores a great deal. The Lupi stared open-mouthed at the climbing weeds, the thistles, the last of the autumn wildflowers. I told myself that I remembered what grass
and flowers looked like, but I couldn't help staring at the creeping bug that startled me, crawling up my leg during dinner.

The first night we slept in a meadow again, Lucia celebrated a special Mass, leading us all in the dance to celebrate the fertility of the land. It was danced in the spring planting season, she said, and at the harvest. It seemed appropriate. I thought about asking her for a dance to ask God to hold off the coming of real winter; I desperately hoped we could be done with what we were doing by the time winter came, although I was doubtful about our chances. Camping in our flimsy tents on bitter winter nights could easily kill half our army without the Circle Guard ever taking a shot at us. If we needed to, we could send people off to the resettled towns, but I feared that the Circle would hunt us down over the winter months—and if they didn't, people would grow comfortable, reluctant to leave their new homes and families in the spring.

We moved a little slowly the first full day back in green Verdia, staring at the trees and the bugs and the sparrows. We let our horses forage, and cut some real tent poles. I called a halt early in the day to let people relax a little, and sat down under a tree to practice my violin, with Michel standing watch nearby. Just as I started to unlace the ties of my violin case, I heard hooves crashing through the brush. I looked up to see Vitale throw himself off the horse.

“Generale Eliana,” Vitale gasped. “Tomas sent me.” He struggled for breath to speak.

I put my hand on his shoulder, glancing past him. “Get Giovanni and Lucia,” I ordered one of my soldiers, but only Giovanni appeared in time to hear Vitale's message.

“Felice. Is he here? Have you seen him?”

I shook my head. “No. I haven't seen him. He was supposed to stay with Tomas.”