[X] I stage a short ceremony of remembrance for our Tierran dead.
You set up camp on the edge of the battlefield and steel your nerves for the trial that is to come. Then, with Lord Renard in tow, you head out into the field of Blogia.
The terrain itself is much as you remember it, but now it is littered with the wreckage of two armies. Wherever you go, the ground is littered with discarded weapons turned to rust by time, scraps of cloth so faded that you cannot even tell if they had once been Tierran orange or Antari homespun, and bones; so many bones that they jut out from the ground in jagged pale edges like a field of stark white grass.
It is difficult enough to figure out whether one bone belonged to a Tierran or an Antari, jumbled together as they are. You must rely upon close inspection: the battered brass of a sabre hilt, the withered strands of a Kentauri sword knot, the shredded ruin of a cuirassier's riding boot, still clinging to the leg of its wearer. Perhaps Elson's bones are among them. Your heart fills with quiet dread each time you sift through the skeletal tangle, lest you find your friend's silver signet ring around a bleached-white finger.
But you do not, and you are not certain whether to thank or curse the Saints for that.
You set the men to building a pyre, not the rough piles of kindling and firewood of the sort used for field cremations but a proper one: carefully cut logs placed crosswise in a square, doused in lamp oil.
By sunset, all is in readiness.
You assemble your men. Linen-wrapped bones in hand, you say a few words of remembrance for the dead. There are no sounds save the whisper of the evening breeze when you place the bundle on the pyre and light the oil-soaked wood. The ceremony itself is all rightness and decorum, but that does not hide the emotion that fills the air, mingling with the smoke as the ashes of the dead are blown skywards by the cold wind.
The pyre burns quickly, but some of your men stand even after the last of the wood burns out, and the embers start to fade. Others come to you, veterans of the battle, their expressions forced into impassivity as they thank you.
You pretend not to see the tears in their eyes.
-
Throughout the next week and a half, your column continues working its way northwards. At first, you make good progress, leaving the field of Blogia far behind you.
With each passing day, you begin to see the half-skeletal forests around you return to life, fresh, broad-leafed greenery sprouting on branches once denuded by the cold of the fleeting winter. With the warm breeze in your faces and no sign of hostile partisans, you and your men even begin to relax a little in your saddles, free to enjoy the sight of spring returning to the trees and the small hamlets which sit alongside the road as you pass them by. It is rather pleasant, all things considered.
Unfortunately, it also does not last.
The warmth of spring has long since driven the last snow from the roads, but that does not mean your progress is entirely smooth. Not all the snowmelt has drained away, and in more than one place, they have turned the stretches of unpaved dirt road into a glutinous morass, capable of slowing your column to a crawl. It takes nearly a day to cross the first of these bad spots, even though it is barely five hundred paces from one end to the other. Again and again, such setbacks slow your squadron's progress as it heads further north.
Worse is yet to come.
-
On the fourteenth day out from Blogia, as you are resting and feeding your horses, you find the unmistakable stench of rot emanating from some of the fodder bags. At once, you set your men to throwing out any feed with any sort of discolouration or strange odour.
Ten minutes later, Sandoral approaches you with a sour expression on his face. "I regret to inform you, sir, that almost all of our feed reserves have been fouled: we are down to our last four bales of fodder," he reports.
You do some quick arithmetic in your head. You find yourself frowning at the result. "That would barely suffice for a day's supply."
Your subordinate nods grimly. "The horses will starve before we reach the King's Army, sir."
"Sandoral!" Lieutenant Blaylock pushes his way into the conversation, rare worry plain on his features. "What's this I hear about the horses starving?"
When you and Sandoral explain the situation to him, Blaylock relaxes. "Is that all?" he scoffs. "That's hardly a problem, sir. There are villages all along the road. They've got fodder, we've got guns. Simple enough, if you ask me."
"We ain't footpads, Blaylock," Lord Renard exclaims, inserting himself into the impromptu staff meeting with a pointed look. "Ain't nothing stoppin' us from buying fodder from th' locals, like gentlemen."
"What about food for our men?"
Sandoral shakes his head. "We've still enough food for the men. Barring any major incidents, we'll be able to make it with a little bit to spare, so there should be no need to worry about that, thank the Saints."
"Which ain't help the fact that y'can't feed a horse on hardtack and salt pork," Lord Renard remarks bitterly. "Do that, they get sick." A sheepish pause. "Trust me. I've tried."
"At least it's one less thing we'll have to worry about," you reply.
Your officers nod, though they still wear expressions of unease as they await your decision.
[] "If we ration carefully, our fodder supplies could last."
[] "We'll buy from the locals."
-[] "This is my responsibility as squadron commander; I shall take on the cost myself." (-120 Wealth)
-[] "The purchase of supplies should be the responsibility of each individual troop commander."
-[] "Perhaps we might require each man to take personal responsibility for feeding his mount?"
[] "We can take what we need from the Antari villagers."
