Mending Wounds
Thirteenth Day of the Second Month 294 AC
A plague of dead rats is not what you had expected for the legions' first true engagement of the war. You certainly had not been expecting more than five hundred dead and three and a half thousand sick and walking wounded from scratches and bites, but though the dead will remain dead, their bodies sent back for honorable burial through the gate to Sorcerer's Deep, the sick you can help.
It takes the remainder of the day to identify all the sick and wounded, especially since many of the old hands at war are used to a standard of 'sick' that one junior officer defined only half in jest as 'puking too hard to march'. Once the sergeants and mages laid down what an infected wound looks like and everyone who needed it gathered up, the legion mages drew up rough circles to your specifications and people were ushered in to be healed.
Between yourself and Malarys alone you could probably heal as many as ten thousand men in a day if you were willing to stack them up like cord wood for the moment of spell-work, you realize, surprised. A useful thing to know, to be sure, but it could only be done if there are enough healthy soldiers to keep watch. Arranging everyone like that takes time, precision and you would not call them battle ready as soon as they get up, given you had them strip out of armor to fit more tightly.
"Some of the time lost was because of the cheering," Varys notes in your mind.
"Foolish mortals, what did they think you would do, let them wither away and die by your enemy's will?"
Grousing aside, she cannot hide she is pleased with the legionnaires reaction. How could she, after all, when it mirrors your own feelings on the matter. You have lain enchantments upon the blades of thousands, but never before have you healed so many.
"I'm done with laying down cleaning light on the banners," Dany calls you from your silent conversation, not that you could have missed the way her work turned the night golden with
light clearer than any torch or lantern. "If someone managed to somehow miss this army before, they certainly won't now," she adds with a lightly grim smile.
"How did your allies take it?" Malarys asks. He had been very careful not to approach the forces of Sathar and you sense some ambivalence about them. Alone of all your companions he actually speaks the Sarnori tongue without sorcery, but he has no love of seeing them walking as effigies of their own dark end.
"Well enough," Dany shrugs. "Little enough sacrifice that their eyes might hurt from looking at them beside the danger of dead rats bursting from below. They seem in... good spirits about pressing on towards Gornath."
"As good spirits as walking corpses wandering over the ruin of their land can manage, you mean?" Ser Gerold asks with a shake of the head. "Strange times, strange wars." His tone hardens on the last. "But I assure you, Your Grace, the legions will rise to the challenge."
"I have no doubt that you shall," you reply with honest conviction.
What do you do while the army marches on Gornath (10 days)?
[] Follow along, vigilant for anymore unexpected threats
[] Return to Sorcerer's Deep, the rule of the realm and its doings
-[] Write in
[] Write in
OOC: I have the legion going about 30 kilometers/day, which is forced march by Roman standards, but the Romans did not have magic fruit. Not yet edited.
