Forest For The Trees (Book 3) (6 page)

The guard led him through the corridor he remembered,
passing numerous folk scurrying frantically about their business.  Everyone
looked intensely focused, even the maids and the servants.

They departed the large corridor to climb stairs and
wind their way deeper into the palace complex.  After a dozen directional
changes the guard opened a door that loomed ten feet tall, with brass handles
designed to look like thick ropes.  Marik heard no squeaks from the massive
hinges supporting the dark wood, which must have weighed a considerable amount.

He entered a large room with a lofty ceiling cloaked
in shadows.  Lamps were lit solely to illuminate the floor space.  The walls
and floor were of a similar dark wood as the door, though Marik could not
readily identify it.  No one would ever guess he had once been an apprentice in
a woodworker’s shop.  Several throw rugs of various shapes, each an earthy hue,
were scattered around as many comfortable chairs.  Each wall was concealed by
endless shelves filled with old books and random objects.

Dietrik had once mentioned, off the cuff while they
lounged about Baron Atcheron’s meager holding beside the Stoneseams Mountains,
that one could usually tell whether a woman or a man had decorated a particular
room.  Men, according to Dietrik, would unfailingly choose a darker motif,
while women preferred lighter, airy décor.  The only rooms men cared to take
the trouble of outfitting were the ones they personally used on a regular basis
for their work, play or other endeavors.  If that were true, then this wooden,
cave-like atmosphere gave tell to whom made use of the space over the course of
its normal days.

The door shut behind Marik.  He looked back to see
that the guard had departed without a word.  Marik wanted to find Celerity and
hand her a piece of his mind concerning leaving people in the dark with no idea
what was expected of them.

By far the most interesting feature of the room lay
off to one side.  It was a huge table, larger than any he had ever encountered
except the one at the Sestion mansion.  Rectangular, it held a realistic model
of a vast valley.  Short walls were raised around the table’s edges to contain
the diorama.

Miniature trees, buildings, a river, boulders,
shrubbery and other landscaping had been rendered so realistically that Marik
needed to study it closely to see the marks of craftsmanship.  Scattered
throughout the valley were tiny figures of soldiers, some on foot, others
mounted with lances at arms, still others holding bows at the ready.  There
were three armies on the field, as represented by green, red and blue soldiers.

He slowly wandered around the table, studying the
incredible display.  In the narrow walkway left between the table’s long side
and a bookcase crammed with ancient volumes, he noticed words writ on a plaque
set in the six-inch table wall.

Battle of Thrae Valley

Year 2243

Decisive Clash Between:

Basill Cerella’s Forces (Green)

Tristan Warlord Argus Yylan (Red)

Reeock Clan (Blue)

Further down the wall he found a key explaining what
numbers each soldier figure represented.  He studied the diorama until he had a
good feel for the strengths of each force.  The green and red armies were
closely matched.  Blue soldiers matched the combined forces of the other two.

Basill Cerella.  The man who had unified the small
holdings of individual rulers into the larger kingdom of Galemar in a war
lasting over half his own lifetime.  At first glance he appeared to be doomed
in this encounter.  None of the green figures were mounted cavalry.  Half his
men were foot soldiers, with the other half being archers.

The Tristans were almost entirely mounted, bearing
lances and sabers.  From their positioning on the field they looked like they
were enmeshed with fighting the Reeock, but Marik could not say for certain. 
It made little sense as well, given what he knew of the Galemaran histories. 
Basill had been fantastically successful at decimating the old houses, at
forcing them to ride under his banner.  Everyone else in the old lands had put
aside their differences to band together against him.  Why would the Tristan
warlord be fighting against the Reeocks with Basill sitting on his flanks?

He continued studying the board.  Marik could decipher
most of what he saw, and prided himself on it.  Over the last few years working
as a mercenary he had learned much on the matters of warfare.  Let others gain
their knowledge through books on strategy and instructors with inflated egos. 
His expertise had a solid foundation based on hard-won, personal experience. 
Nothing taught a man so much as getting his hands dirty in the real thing.

There were no indications on the board regarding the
time of day.  If he knew the time, he could better guess at what he saw laid
out.  His instincts said it was still early, perhaps late morning, surely not
yet noon.  Basill might be hanging back to evaluate his position when faced by
a group three times the size of his own.

Both the red and blue forces held back a reserve
force, which also indicated the directions from which each had come.  Oddly,
they had come separately rather than together as he first assumed.  That
suggested other possibilities.

Marik reexamined the date of the battle before
remembering it was listed according to the old calendar.  He had no idea what
the corresponding date might be on the post-Unification calendar, and suddenly
realized that it wouldn’t make much difference to him if he did.  The
historical events he knew of were few, and their chronological placement was
beyond his knowledge.  Most of what he had learned of the Tristans he’d found
out from Landon, but only about the events themselves.  When they had taken
place in relation to the rest of Basill’s bloody years, he had no idea.

It startled him to realize that.  He had believed he’d
learned quite a lot from Landon thanks to the archer’s hobby of collecting the
history of every area he ever passed through.  Now he could see that what he
knew hardly so much as scratched the surface.

What reasons could have collided three separate forces
together?  He did not for an instant believe it to be coincidental.  Did the
blue and red forces come under an alliance against Basill?  That made sense
based on what he knew, yet the layout of the soldiers suggested several
discrepancies.  The overwhelming implications of the particular formation in
each ranks suggested they were arranged to defend against one another.

Of course, that wholly assumed that this toy’s layout
was accurate in the least.  If the display were simply meant to amuse visitors,
the last one in this chamber could have entertained himself rearranging the
soldiers to suit whatever fancy he indulged.  No universal law demanded that
the diorama must remain historically accurate.

Still, he had nothing else to occupy him in the room. 
The battle display was far more interesting than whatever the books might
contain.  He let his eyes wander across the field, leaving the figurines
untouched, imagining how a battle such as this might proceed if the arranged
forces had, in fact, been arrayed exactly as shown in miniature.  None of the
possible scenarios he envisioned would bode well for the Unifier of Galemar’s
small forces.  It must have been the hells own battle.

Marik was left to his musings for nearly a half-mark. 
So enthralled had he become that he lost his sense of time passing, and his ire
at being mysteriously summoned no longer rankled.  The heavy door opening
surprised him into an abrupt spin.

In walked a man who immediately made the surrounding
room vanish in Marik’s sight.  Instead of the room, surrounding the man were
the canvas walls of rain-soaked tents, his features illuminated by scattered
braziers filled with coals rather than oil lamps.  The bizarre displacement
held for only a moment before Marik saw him as he was; a man bearing up well
under the weight of his years, dressed trim and still fit as a horse.  Marik needed
no explanation to understand his peculiar moment.  Once before he had seen this
man close up, on the Cracked Plateau prior to the Nolier war.

The knight-marshal advanced with the bearing of a man
about an assigned duty.  He wore none of his rank’s insignia, as when Marik had
seen him distantly during the tournament’s opening ceremony.  His clothing
remained of a military cut, color and material, though.  Marik’s spine
stiffened slightly when the man stopped to study the mercenary without much
fondness evident in his expression.

It was Dietrik who had once been a solider in
Galemar’s army, not he.  Marik spurned a reflexive action to stand at rigid
military attention…though he accepted the older veteran as a warrior worthy of
respect.  Clearly the knight-marshal
lived
his rank and
responsibilities, rather than donning them to wear at court while filling a
position appointed to him.

Since Marik felt as a fish pulled from a flowing
stream to flop in confused bewilderment on the shore, he remained quiet, letting
the knight-marshal speak.  The man still gazed upon him with hard appraisal,
measuring Marik against a standard unknown to the subject of that inspection. 
It increasingly disconcerted him by the moment.

At last, he glanced down at the display.  He had obviously
noticed Marik studying it when he entered.  “A tenuous situation.”

Marik followed the gaze down.  “So it would seem,
sir.”

The knight-marshal shot a quick look at him, probably
as the result of the ‘sir’.  Most mercenaries clashed with any soldier they
encountered.  Little love had ever existed between the two professions.  Marik
understood the general reason why, but had never adopted the bias completely. 
Genuine fighters won his respect.  Animosity shown never gained anything except
animosity returned.  That was why he usually added the ‘sir’ whenever speaking
to an army officer unless the man had already proven he enjoyed harassing
mercenaries simply for the crime of being a mercenary.  Many of the men who had
overseen the construction of the depots during the war had indulged in the
attitude.

His honorific made no dent in the stony visage.  “This
was a key battle fought by Basill Cerella with Faustus Hueart as his master
tactician.  It was
this
battle that sounded the bells of change in the
southlands.  After this, the Tristan warlords and the scattered clans
recognized that Basill was no petty tyrant as bloodthirsty as they.  They
recognized that he was far greater than that.”

He kept his eyes locked on the diorama the entire
time.  If he watched Marik at all, it was only through peripheral vision.  His
tone of voice, too, was far from conversational.  It bore traces of cold steel
and disapproval.

When the knight-marshal halted, waiting for a
response, Marik groped for words, finding the opening gambit in this
conversation exceedingly odd.  “I suppose, then, that means this battle…the
battle at Thrae Valley took place in the early years of the Unification.”

That brought the man’s gaze fully upon him.  The
disapproval in his hard eyes intensified.  “Year thirteen.”  He bit the words
off forcefully.  “The wars of the Unification lasted twenty-two years.  The
Tristans had never cared one bit what the northern lords were about, and paid
Basill’s awesome efforts no heed whatsoever!  One warlord had already fallen. 
It was the subjugation of Argus Yylan that finally opened their eyes to their
dwindling days of power.”

Marik examined the display in order to break
eye-contact with the old warrior.  “Faustus must have been an accomplished
strategist to win against such odds.”

As soon as the words left his mouth, the truth of the
matter struck Marik.  He instantly wished he could rephrase the statement in
order to prevent the testy response already forming on the knight-marshal’s
lips.  “Faustus Hueart indeed
was
such an individual, as befitting the
man who would be labeled ‘Basill’s Arm’.  Later, of course, after Basill
Cerella bestowed a name upon his army, the title was altered to make him into
the hand that struck with all that formidable strength behind it.  The Arm of
Galemar.”

His words made Marik feel foolish.  He wanted to reply
in a confident manner, yet while he struggled for such a response, he knew that
anything he said would sound inane.  In lieu of words, he elected to fold his
arms and nod once at the table.

“You are combat experienced,” the knight-martial
observed, “and been through battles where the most unexpected turns of events
have occurred.”  He nodded at the diorama.  “If
you
were there, leading
the green forces, tell me what you would have done.  How would you have
attained the victory that Basill Cerella claimed that day?”

Marik’s arms unfolded.  He wanted to ask what this was
about, but thought he might know after all, strange as it seemed.

Since the mysterious invaders had crossed the Stoneseams,
bringing their monstrous beasts with them, Marik had been one of the few to
face them multiple times in combat.  With his mage senses active as well, it
was possible that he had greater knowledge about the bull-creatures than anyone
else with first-hand experience.  Could they have possibly summoned him in
order to help supplement their knowledge regarding the terrifying creatures? 
Was this banter about a battle long since over merely a tool the knight-marshal
intended to use in order to gauge Marik’s understanding of warfare, and thus
see how reliable any information the mercenary presented might be?