The Cobalt's Tend

PART 1

     The sun was setting as Harland and Deshler made their way out of the swamps and through the dusty plains, arriving at the small town of Rousic. It had been nearly a day's ride heading east to reach the swamps, and then another day's ride back into town with the wagon now weighed down and the horses moving just a tad slower. The four men they had killed out in that once-abandoned shack had been wanted murderers and pillagers - highwaymen, as the locals throughout the province called them.

     The two bounty hunters made their way over to the small deputy outpost where they would exchange the bodies for the meager sum of sixty dollars which would be split between them. Of course, the bodies would have to be identified first, taking nearly an hour to complete thanks to the procrastination of a junior lieutenant who wished to make his role in the matter seem more significant than it actually was. After the formalities had ended and the hunters were paid their reward, the two men hitched their horses and wagon, and wandered off down the stoney road towards the town's tavern.

     Of course, calling Rousic a town was being rather generous. The cluster of buildings included little more than the outpost, a general goods store, a single tavern, and a hotel down the street a ways. There were also a few small shacks you could call houses, if only to be polite, and a few hitching posts at each end of the road.

     It was about thirty feet before the tavern when they were stopped at the side of the street by a strange woman who had seemingly no business being where she was. The winds blew dust down the drag and the lantern flames that lined the street flickered, sending soft shadows dancing across their path. The woman appeared young, in her twenties maybe, wearing ragged clothing as her eyes fixated upon the two men. She was staring at them as if they were some sort of outlanders, who had just wandered upon an unwelcoming host. Beside her stood a makeshift table which was fashioned from wood scraps, with a single metal pail resting upon it.

     "You should go back," she warned the two sternly.

     Both men already knew why she was there. Before the Empire had completely conquered the eastern half of the territory, many of the natives had begun to flee out into the western part of the continent. The locals knew they were no match against the Royal Army, and sought refuge among their sacred swamplands. However, the King's son, Prince Alsay, refused to stop his expansion at the territory's eastern coast. With his father granting him title as the ruling commander of the Empire's territorial forces, he had pushed his men out west as well, expanding his claims farther every year and encouraging settlers to build along the way to help strengthen them.

     With the natives now running out of space and unable to escape the Empire's reach, they grew angry and desperate, fighting back where they could with brutish guerrilla tactics that never actually seemed to accomplish much. In their defense, Harland didn't truly agree with how foolishly the settler's tore into the land as they expanded - but to be fair, his experience in the western half of the territory made him question just what it was that the natives were now fighting for. The land out west was mostly dusty badlands, barren, with little more than a few extensive patches of swamp. They were treacherous areas that he mostly avoided whenever possible. The land was barely farmable, mostly uninhabitable, and in the winter it could rain for weeks on end, flooding most areas in up to a foot or two of water.

     Of course Deshler being a former Guardsmen - a notable officer of the Royal Fourth Unit in fact, had no concern over the land or the natives. His father was a Guardsmen as well, so he was never raised to be aware of the more trivial problems that arise for farmers or common settlers in the territory. That was perhaps the biggest difference between Harland and his partner. But this woman was not a native herself. She looked to be a colonist of the Empire, although probably from the far eastern countries of the Empire's expansion, as she possessed a tanned skin with jet black hair and eyes to match. It was common in the western half of the territory for the natives to persuade and embrace a few settlers to join their tribes - an effort to grow their numbers and increase their strength in hopes of driving the Empire out. It was of course a futile effort, and both men knew it.