The False Martyr (46 page)

#

There was no chance that
they would surprise the army below, not that Jaret had really
considered it a possibility. The sun was just peeking above the
horizon, and the soldiers below looked like they had been prepared
for hours – which they likely had. Jaret wondered if any of them
had been allowed to sleep. It opened the possibility that they
would be tired, but he knew the lie of that as well. Men almost
never slept before a battle – certainly he had not, and he doubted
his men had. Still, no man ever died in a fight because he was
caught in the middle of a yawn. And it wouldn’t matter if those men
were sleeping as they stood, there were a thousand of them arrayed
along the line of trees. The first ranks held tall shields and long
spears, but there were surely archers behind those to ensure that
Jaret and his men never made it to the spears. Any hope he dreamt
up was just that, a dream as real as the ones where he flew like a
bird or fucked the Emperor’s daughter.

Walking across the top of
the hill, through the trees that marked it like a ramshackle fort,
Jaret nodded to his men, clapped them on the arm or back, reassured
them with his eyes as they made their final preparations. He
marveled at their discipline. They were about to die in the most
pointless and futile way possible, but not a hand shook, not an eye
turned away, not a doubt shown. Jaret wondered what he had ever
done to deserve such devotion.

On the other side of the
hill, the cavalry were on their horses, preparing their formation,
receiving final orders from their officers. They wore full armor
for the first time that Jaret had seen – fine armor at that, full
plate with barding for the horses. Banners snapping in the morning
breeze at their sides – the sun rising over the image of a rearing
horse – explained the extravagant protection. These were the
Knights Imperial, the best equipped, most disciplined, and loyal of
any unit outside Jaret’s legionnaires. This was a fraction of their
numbers, but Emperor Nabim had to have sent them personally to hunt
down Jaret and his fugitive band. There was no doubt that they
would be equal to the task.

As Jaret watched, they
tested their weapons, long-handled maces ideal for beating down
unarmored men from behind. Meant to be used on revolting peasants
as they ran from the cavalry charge, they would be just as
effective on Jaret and his men as they ran across the field.
Nonetheless, the scene gave Jaret a small glimmer of hope. It meant
that the cavalry meant to charge. It was the first of what Jaret
expected to be many strategic blunders by Empire’s incompetent
officers. He just wished it would make any difference.

“
To the north, Commander,”
interrupted Jaret’s thoughts. He looked up and saw a
broad-shouldered legionnaire with a baby’s face – had he shaved
this morning? – pointing through the trees to his left.

When Jaret reached the
man’s side, he laughed. He could not help himself. Even the wall
that seemed to block his emotions could not hold it back. He
laughed until he was out of breath and had to brace himself against
a tree. The remainder of the Legion gathered around. The younger
members stared at their commander in disbelief. It was only the
veterans, those with some years and battles behind them that got
the joke. Though they did not laugh as hard as their commander,
they raised their heads and chuckled like fools at the joke the
Order had played.

“
We’re twenty men,” Jaret
guffawed when he had recovered enough for words. “What do they
think is going to happen here today?” Those who had been laughing
shook their heads, wiped tears from their eyes, and went back to
their places on the west side of the hill. Those who had failed to
see the joke lingered, looking truly uncertain for the first
time.

Youth!
Jaret thought. He had forgotten that men only realized they
were mortal when they reached their thirtieth birthday. These few,
these boys, as skilled as they might be, as well trained, as
disciplined, had not realized that they were going to die, that it
was going to happen today, that nothing their brilliant, miraculous
commander did would save them.

“
Lord commander,” another
of the men began.

“
It changes nothing,”
Jaret answered the question before it was asked. “Nothing at all.”
He looked one last time at the third force marching – running by
the look of it – from the north. Another five hundred men from
another side. He wondered if another regiment was on its way from
the south, but he didn’t bother to look. The sun was up, it was
time to die.

#

“
What do you see?” Lius
turned at the sound of Jaret’s voice, watched the general take a
position beside him next to the last tree before the hill they
occupied became a plain. Lius wanted to state the obvious in reply,
that he saw a thousand men preparing to kill them, five hundred
more racing in from the north to get their piece, another hundred
on horseback behind to ensure that there was no escape, but he knew
that was not what Jaret meant.

“
I can’t see anything,”
Lius admitted between pants. His legs shook, bladder and bowels
felt like they would release even though he had just emptied them,
heart pounded though he’d done nothing but stand by this tree since
the moment they’d arrived the evening before. He’d spent that
entire time trying to puzzle a way for the Order to help them, for
a way to change the outcome of this day, a way to just survive. He
had found none. The problem was simply too big. With all the men
below, all the turmoil of battle, there were countless
possibilities, a million things that could change, but no matter
what path Lius took, the end was always the same: the death of
Jaret, the legionnaires, and himself.

Perhaps if he had more
time – years? – or more experience. Valatarian said in his book
that you had to look at the patterns within the Order, not
individual strands, that you had to alter the pattern to make real
change, but every time Lius tried, he became hopelessly lost. And
he had been so desperately focused on the men before them, on
finding a way through them, that he had not even noticed that
another army was coming from the north, had not even counted them
in his calculations. Now, the time had come, and every bit of it
was for naught.

“
So you think the Order
has abandoned us?” Jaret asked the question at a whisper so that
the men gathering around would not hear.

“
It never abandons us,”
Lius responded almost without thought. “Even our deaths are part of
Its plan. Death is as much a part of the Order as life. We must
welcome it so that we can return to Its embrace.” Lius could not
believe what he was saying even as the words came out of his mouth.
Certainly, he had believed that when he was in the Hall of
Understanding reading books and writing treatises. It was easy to
welcome death when it was far away, but now?

“
You know what I mean,”
Jaret pressed. He broke away to clap the arm of a man who was
passing by. The man held a sort of shield that he had made of
branches tied together with the straps of his pack. It looked like
a joke, but Lius guessed it was better for stopping an arrow than
the man’s chest.

“
If anything, you are a
bigger enigma than ever before,” Lius answered. “Part of the reason
I cannot find a way for the Order to help us is that everything
starts with you, and I cannot predict what you will do. You
influence too much, and you are entirely outside my control.” Lius
knew that was only half the truth. The hole in the Order that was
Jaret Rammeriz had certainly grown, become more significant and
less predictable, but there were only so many things that Jaret
could possibly do, and Lius had traced them all. Unless he somehow
grew wings and carried them all away, Lius had considered it and it
ended the same.

“
Then we can only trust in
the Order as you say,” Jaret conceded. He took a deep breath and
looked out at the field before him. The men around him wavered,
clutched their weapons, and panted for anticipation of what was to
come. They waited only for the command from behind. Jaret had
ordered his lieutenant to watch the cavalry. He had whispered
specific orders to him, but Lius knew that the young man was to
stay on the hill, to hide, and then find a way to carry word of
what had happened, to keep the resistance to Emperor Nabim alive.
Though he knew why it could not happen, Lius was terribly jealous
that he was not the one chosen to carry the word, to tell the
story, to stay alive.

“
Now!” Lieutenant Caspar
called from the other side of the hill.

“
Hold!” Jaret called in
return. Every eye turned to him. The order made no sense. Their
charge was to be perfectly timed. To wait a second was to be
overrun by the riders from behind. Everyone knew that, and now they
could only stare as their commander disobeyed his own
command.

Lius was too overwhelmed
to stare. With that one word, everything had changed. In one
startling moment, the entire Order, every pattern, shifted. It was
like nothing he had ever experienced and far more than he could
possibly digest. He searched through those possibilities, looking
for the clues that the Order must have left. The moment stretched
out for what seemed an eternity. The sound of the charging knights
behind them rose. The men became anxious, surprise turning to fear,
and Lius started to understand. He traced the possibilities, read
the patterns, and realized that he had been wrong all along. Jaret
had not changed the patterns as much as he had allowed Lius to see
them in a different way. And with that realization, he knew what he
needed to do.

“
For the glory of the
Empire!” Jaret Rammeriz called just as Lius was reaching out for
him. Since they were preparing to fight three regiments of Imperial
soldiers, the battle cry did not seem appropriate, but the other
legionnaires took it up as they chased their commander down the
hill, sprinting toward their certain deaths with all the fervor of
madmen. And Lius was left gawking at the patterns before him, at
the sudden realization of what he had to do. He ran after Jaret
with all his might, praying that his body was strong enough to make
use of the opening the Order had given them.

#

Why in the Order’s holy
name did I hold?
Jaret asked himself as he
ran toward the waiting spears. With each step, each panted breath,
he asked the question. He had planned the timing meticulously, had
given Lieutenant Caspar exact instruction, then overridden them for
some reason he could not possibly explain. And it had ruined
everything. If they’d timed it correctly – had gone on Lieutenant
Caspar’s command – they would have arrived at the line of spears
before them at the same moment as the charging knights behind.
Surely those knights would pull up but not before they covered the
legionnaire’s approach, not before they removed the archers
entirely from the equation – woe be the archer who killed an
imperial knight with an arrow that happened to fly too
far.

At least that had been the
plan. Now, Jaret listened to the hoof beats behind, like the rumble
of an earthquake, and knew that they would never outrun that wave.
They would be bludgeoned from behind, would die every bit as
pointless a death as if they’d been filled with arrows half-way
across the field. It would have been better to stay on the hill, to
be surrounded and slowly torn apart. At least then they would have
taken a few of Nabim’s men with them.

But it had not been his
choice. Again, the Order had controlled him, and he’d had no power
to change any of it.
Dead is
dead
, he told himself, emotion held behind
by the barrier that Nabim’s henchman had given him. He chuckled to
himself at the thought.
Maybe having my
brains splattered across this field was what the Order had in mind
all along.

In further confirmation of
the inevitability behind, the boys before them began to relax.
Their fear hardened faces grew slack, eyes showed relief, grips
loosed on spears, shields sagged. In other scenarios, Jaret and his
men might have killed a number of them before they were
overwhelmed, but the Order had chosen them today. They were spared.
Jaret almost felt happy for them.

A glance to the north
showed the third force had nearly arrived. They charged in, running
with spears and shields at their sides. Jaret could not guess why.
He and his men were sprinting toward the southern side of the
waiting lines for that very reason. There was not the slightest
chance that the men to the north would be involved, not now or
ever.

And behind, the clamor of
hooves, the creak of armor, the rattle of weapons had grown louder.
The riders were almost on them. Death was almost there.

“
Sto . . . sto . . . sto .
. .” a panting voice, unable even to complete the word, sounded
from Jaret’s back. It was Lius. Jaret had forgotten about the monk
in his confusion, but he supposed the man was right. Better to give
death your face than your back. Jaret slowed.

Lius tackled him. The
little man threw himself at Jaret and, in a moment of complete
surprise, sent him tumbling to the ground.

“
Rally!” the monk yelled
for some reason as he tumbled. It was not much of a call, but the
legionnaires responded. They came to an immediate halt, several of
them sliding, nearly falling, as they arrested their momentum, and
sprang back to surround their commander, who was lying in a pile,
tangled in the damp, stinking robes of a monk.