The Radiant War

Chapter 14a

     “We've got company!” called out Captain Tamwell, sitting up in his saddle.

     Beside him, Captain Brailsford also sat up, shading his eyes with his free hand, and so did most of the rest of the column. Princess Ardria couldn't see anything at first, but then she saw a column of dust on the horizon, bending away to the south as it rose into a layer of high altitude wind. Horsemen, she realised. Quite a lot of them, and coming in their direction.

     “Everyone hold up your white flags,” She called out. “Nobody under any circumstance draw a weapon.”

     “You think it’s cavalry?” asked Teena from the back of Geoffham’s horse. “Carrow cavalry?"

     “We've gotten much further than I ever expected to without seeing them,” replied the Princess. “Without seeing much of anything, for that matter, except dust.” She slapped at her gown, causing a cloud of dust to lift up from it, revealing a trace of the original sky blue. It was in her hair too, and all over her skin. She must look a fright! The sooner they came across a place with enough water for her to have a good wash, the better.

     The whole country seemed to be parched. They'd seen crops withering in the fields and the only cattle had been the occasional goat nibbling on straw coloured clumps of grass, one of which the soldiers had butchered two days ago to supplement their trail rations. Every farm they came across had been abandoned, some quite recently, and their wells had contained only a few inches of dirty water, just enough for them to refill their water bottles. Every member of the Princess’s retinue had stared in horror at the withered countryside. This had, once, been the best farmland that Carrow had left, the remnant of the lush, fertile Tweenlands that they’d managed to hold onto after the rest had seceded to Helberion, and Ardria was struck by the comparison with what they’d seen on the other side of the border. Helberion had seen bumper harvests for two years now, and yet it was only a few days travel across flat, featureless lands from the devastating sights they were seeing now.

     “I estimate about a hundred men,” said Tamwell, looking through a small pair of binoculars he'd pulled from a pouch on his belt. “And I see glints of sunlight, probably reflected from weapons. They're definitely coming this way. They've probably seen our dust already.”

     “We'll wait for them here,” said Ardria. “Everyone dismount.”

     The Princess herself remained in the saddle, though. She knew the importance of creating the right first impression. She had to give the impression of casual, assured authority, even though they were all carrying flags of truce and trying to make themselves look as harmless and unthreatening as possible. She beckoned Teena over to join her, then guided her horse to the front of the column so that the approaching men would be focused on her, rather than the armed men behind her.

     It seemed to take a long time for the Carrowmen to reach them, but gradually the tiny, dark forms of mounted men could be seen at the base of the column of dust. “Carrow home guard,” said Brailsford. He had moved his men directly behind the Princess and positioned them so that their Kelvon uniforms would be clearly visible. “The old. The infirm. The only just declared human, but they have five times our numbers and there’ll be nothing wrong with their weapons. If things turn nasty, we're finished.”

     “Then let’s make sure things don’t turn nasty,” replied the Princess.

     As the riders approached they spread out, forming a line that stretched across the horizon ahead of them. “Everybody remain calm,” said Tamwell as the Carrowmen drew their swords. “There will be no fighting today.”

     We hope, the Princess silently prayed. We haven't come all this way to die now.

     “What do we do if they attack?” asked Corporal Naeve nervously.