Rising Moon

~Chapter Nine~

Hector stared down the group of men and women, his eyes blazing. Almost all of them were shaking, and some of the younger ones looked like they were holding back tears. Then Hector turned to face his sister.

Adira had been standing on the sidelines for some time now, and Hector knew it, but she was perfectly capable of waiting. The warrior needed to get this point across to his soldiers, if he could even call them that. But finally, he decided that he had said and done enough.

"I dismiss you to Lady Adira," Hector said, waving them away. "She's taking over your afternoon drilling. Fall out!"

Hector turned on his heel and strode away with his head held high. Adira began her work with the refugee soldiers as if she hadn't been watching what just happened. However, someone else had been watching, and they didn't intend to pass it off as nothing.

Eugene jogged up to his friend's side and glared at him out of the corner of his eye.

"What's with the side-eye?" Hector asked.

"Must you be so hard on them?" Eugene said angrily. "You've been rough since the start, but this? Come on, Hector! Do you even care about them? They're doing their best!"

"And their best is going to get them killed if it's not improved. What happens when they freak out like Sigeferthsson did? What happens when the enemy takes advantage of that? What then, your highness?"

Eugene winced and froze when Hector spat out those last words. He looked hurt. Hector noticed and stopped walking. He turned back to his friend, and his voice softened as he spoke.

"I do care about them. I care about them quite a lot. They're my soldiers. And that's exactly why I'm hard on them. If they can't even string a bow when someone is shouting at them, what makes you think they'll survive being on a battlefield? If they lose focus for even a second, they'll be killed, and that leaves less defense for the rest. They make up a third of our fighters. An army that shuts down as soon as it's pressured isn't an army at all. When they're all dead because they couldn't keep it together, who will be there to protect the old and the injured?

"I'm trying to keep everyone alive, Eugene. If that means I have to be cruel to them, so be it. War is cruel. I had hoped that you would understand that. I really don't appreciate you biting my head off about everything. I know you're worried about Rapunzel, and we're doing the best we can to get a message to her, but you being like this isn't helping anyone."

Eugene scowled down at the ground but kept his mouth shut. Hector sighed. He thought it was best to leave the prince be, so he walked away and left Eugene behind. Hector would find a time to talk to him later, but for now he needed to go visit his squires. Then it would be back to training with the refugee soldiers. He would be with them for the rest of the day. They were his top priority.

It had been a month, and yet they still were nowhere near ready to fight. The Loyalist runners and spies had brought back more information on the movements of the Insurrectionist, but General Ulysses was seriously considering bringing all of the spies back to the Loyalist sanctuary for good. They had lost fifteen spies to the suicide pills in just the past three weeks. They were getting caught almost every time they were sent out. The Insurrectionists were taking more precautions and had tripled security around the palace in the capital. General Ulysses was worried that one of his spies would be caught and would be unable to take the poison in time. The Insurrectionist would torture the location of the sanctuary out of the spies, and the Loyalists would be attacked before they were anywhere near ready to fight back.

However, this would mean that many if not all of the runners would be sent back as well. They couldn't risk any of them being caught while they were searching for supplies and people. But this meant that the effort to get a message to Queen Rapunzel of Corona would have to stop. Without a proper warning, the queen would arrive in the Capital, right into the Insurrectionists hands.