Chapter 1

Have you ever been to the veldt?

Everybody understands it as a flat or rolling landscape, treeless for miles, and nothing but grass. You might think of it as an “ocean of grass” as too many others do. But a stretch of country cannot be just what one can see… or hear… or smell… though the odors of earth and wild hay defines the land better for some; if you can smell it out at sea or whilst still in town, then you are already there. Yet even that won’t really do.

A country is a collection of stories. Awesome stories. Humdrum stories. Loves. Fears. The tales told and retold over countless campfires of everyone who slept out under the starry night among that smell of earth. There is one tale, though, that stands out, never fails to be mentioned at some point if you stay for even a day with the country folk. Of a great ditch, a grand moat across the prairie that was excavated to serve as a boundary betwixt the land of the living and the realm of the dead… and the one who put it there.

It was one of the best-known stories of the Old Veldt.

The Woman Who Dug the Sea

Taran the Axe was a giant of a lady, or so the story went. There was really no full narrative of her exploits among the veldt folk, just tidbits dropped in conversation, quite casually in fact, as one would of something that everybody knows happened in history. Newcomers and visitors to this land were overawed by the herdsmen in the camps and the taverns recounting their stays at places where Taran slept, Taran caught the monster boar, Taran slew a hundred raiders with a motorcycle for a club, Taran planted the oak, Taran pooped, Taran this, Taran that. The offhandedness of these remarks made Taran much more legendary than if some blind poet sang an entire epic of her.

The most well-known feat, however, was that she dug the great oceanic channel that cut clear across the veldt. An actual foaming, churning sea in the middle of the prairie which ran from horizon to horizon. The sight of this Seaway, as was that of the great and ancient, gigantic Bridge that spanned it, was itself as incredible as any tall tale. Who dug this ocean? Who built that bridge? Well… who else?

But both the Seaway and the Bridge have been there from long ago. They were there before Taran was born. Where they came from or how they came to be had been forgotten in the mists of time. So the next question might as well be… Where did Taran really come from?

A legend, of course, will always have an element of confusion to it, especially as to its origins. So it is perhaps more fitting to begin looking for the answer to our question in such a confusing time as war.

About an hour after the battle, the horrific din had ebbed away, and even the moans of the dying were silenced amidst the creaking of twisted metal in the wind. About an hour’s ride from the battlefield, the odors of blood and gunpowder were forgotten in the night air. Now, there was not a clue that any conflict happened anywhere in the vast, sleepy countryside outside the village of Fom, where Wiseley’s grove had been planted eighty years back.

The stallion, at full gallop, darted over the low brush that lay as far as the eye can make out in the darkness and leapt over the low hedges. It was an uncomfortable ride for the two of them. Taran, who had only learned to ride a month past, could only cling miserably to the horse’s mane to try not to fall off, whilst the hastily-bandaged companion Athos was being beaten up in his saddle. Hang on there… Hang on there, bud!

Let’s see… From the moment she cleared the grove there were about eight or ten riding after them, but they did not find her soon enough, so by the time they gave chase, there was a decent stretch in between. What really concerned her was their not letting up in pursuit, perhaps hoping their stamina would outlast hers. After taking a sharp turn northward, she lost some of them, but six were still in the chase. They were still there after night has fallen and their searchlights were lit.

At such distance and speed it made little sense to shoot, but shoot they did, maybe as a sort of last resort to somehow catch her before losing her in the darkness. It only egged her onward.

It had been nearly an hour now. Taran squinted through the wind and looked out for any points of light on the horizon. There were about three of them to the south last she saw, and they were gone. Their pursuers seem to have dropped out, but she resolved to ride until midnight to put enough distance behind, as they might send a search party early the following morning.

Her terrified breath was white in the cold wind, mingling with that of the horse.

She checked the horizon again, there were still no lights, only the powdery host of stars overhead, but she could never be sure. The shrillness of whistles and pinging bullets still sounded inside her head. It has not been even a day since, after all.

She remembered something. Why now? One of her pet terrors as a child and even now was a stray bullet offing her in her sleep.

“Then why did you join up?” Athos had laughed at her over this. “There will be plenty of loose shots where we are going.”

“Ar’nt they troopers? They know how to shoot, right? We should know exactly where those bullets are coming from.”

Shrug. “In times like this, they will recruit all sorts of riffraff to fight. To pad their numbers. It’s a numbers game, really.”

And Taran laughed back at that. “So the enemy is nothin’ but an army of buffoons!”

That must be the reason why they were among the survivors… right? Their adversaries were dunces, halfwits who couldn’t shoot straight… and who just might off her somewhere without her knowing it.

A lowly warlord like Five-Moon would collect the dregs to do her dirty work, alright, but not Treverorum. Not the Treverorian Empire. She and Athos were adventurers, paid richly from spoils, experts in the field. The both of them have fought together with the marines in Cascadia and at the gates of Tigris against the Daughter of Heaven, not to mention holding their own in street brawls in their native Aquileia, the port city of the capital. Heh. Even their looks set them apart. Both were quite youthful, and Athos’ brown hair was a great match to Taran’s tawny-honey blonde, trimmed short to try offset its thick growth.

Athos and her are a class of their own… right? That is why they survived where so many have perished… right?

The horse began to falter. Is it midnight yet? Is here the right place to stop? She nonetheless pulled on the stallion’s mane, and she could almost feel it thanking her as it slowed gracefully to a halt, nickering softly without a trace of the fear and tension of pursuit. She dismounted, rather awkwardly with the large rucksack, and tried to ease Athos off the saddle, but the groans told her she was not handling him all too gently… and that he had not passed out. “You’re still here…” she breathed with immense relief. She slung the sack in front and took him onto her back.

She turned to the horse. “Stay with us, alright? We don’t know this place.” What was she even saying? This was a mount she had just stolen, this was from the enemy camp. She must be halfway mad already. “Don’t go far, there is plenty of hay around here.” And she carried her charge to the stands of camphor and oak to the east.

They were not even midway to the trees when she heard loud neighing behind. Oh no—the horse was galloping away!

No…

Taran’s heart sank. Her lips quivered. There was no way she could reconnoiter for any habitation in this strange land on foot.

Athos’s coughing did not make her feel any better.

“Aths? Aths, calm down. It’s alright…” She turned her gaze back to the now absent horse. She held back her sobbing. “We’ll find a way…”

She made him lean against the foot of an oak, and then looked over the gear. There was a motley assortment of stuff she had grabbed in a hurry to escape the field. It was confusing. Even simple chores like this pushed her to the brink of tears… No. Huff… Keep calm, Taran. She turned her attention to the largest items.

There were only one large sheet of tarp from the saddle, which she struggled to tear in half; one part was tied to the branches to serve as a roof and the other laid on the ground to accommodate Athos. It did not even catch the full height of his body—his calves were left lying on the damp grass. But it will have to do.

With the night goggles she checked the bandage and splint, fixing where she could. Athos was whimpering the whole time, she could tell he was hurting all over. “I’m so sorry, buddy,” she sobbed, “Me am not getting you atop an animal ever again.” She grabbed his hand, and he gripped back as best he could. She smiled through the tears. “That’s my Athos,” she whispered in his ear. After which she turned to the rest of the gear to make soup.

The can of butane was still about three-quarters full. She should be able to make it last for a couple days. If not, she might have to gather dry grass, as there was plenty of the stuff lying around, not to mention wood from the trees here… but that calls for an open fire. If there were patrols looking out for survivors, the smoke during the day and the faintest glow of a campfire at night shall give them away. The butane will have to do. She decided to make enough soup to fill the thermos jug.

There was a bar of soap, probably for laundry. There was no time for hygiene when on the run.

“I’m going ahead, Taran!” Athos had said outside the shower. It was just before the night they were sail out of Treverorum. “I’ll be at the capital till five. Ship leaves at six.”

“Hey no fair! I haven’t even packed yet!”

“Then drag yourself out of that bath this moment. You’re being a girl again.”

“Will you just shut your trap!?” she snapped. These girl remarks really get to her. “What about you being a goat? Showering only as long as you brush, seriously…”

“If you keep that up, I will tell Trawitz you’re actually a girl. You can’t hire yourself to anyone if you get blacklisted in Treverorum, just saying.”

Nah.

Athos was just being a jerk. As soon as things have calmed down enough, a wash of both clothing and the bodies they clothed will be at the top of her list. Her hair was already quite stringy, and everything else was already going rank.

She had finished her supper and was now lying against the foot of an oak in her blanket, trying to calm down and sleep. She left a mug of the soup on the grass next to Athos’ head, with a drinking straw in case he had regained enough strength to sip. He was sound asleep, however, snoring even. She gazed out to the field. This time she wanted to see some lights, not from the enemy, of course, she wanted to know if there was perhaps any sign of civilization around.

A couple of weeks before, at around this same hour of the night, their accommodations were much more agreeable.

The city of the Lady Four-Leaf by the seaway of Asage can be seen for miles over the surrounding veldt, and much further out at night. It was highly beautiful in the darkness, a veritable city of gold. It was a common remark in that region of Ozhakoland that even when the sun set in the west, night did not fall, as sunrise immediately lit the eastern sky where the city stood on the coast. It was more of a citadel, really. There was a collection of large buildings, mansions, standing over a vibrant marketplace on one side, and a massive depot on the other where the lady’s mechanized columns were parked, as well as the harbor that held her personal fleet of two battleships, among others. However, tonight the guests she received were not down in the depot with the machines, everybody were at the great ballroom where wine flowed.

Well… certainly the host was flowing with it herself.

Taran remembers her voice as sultry. Lady Four-Leaf stood tall on a balcony high above the heads of the audience. She still had her wits about her to be sure, her talking was straight, commanding even, as that of a warlord was wont to be, but one could easily tell she had taken her fair share of alcohol when quite a bit of emotion had leaked into her speech.

“Gentlemen! Everybody knows that the best things in life gather at a few choice spots in the world; my friends, you are in one such place. You have all decided that you deserve only the finest of the finest the world has to offer. I am one with all of you! Cheers! Cheers to joining me in our journey together as we all rise!”

The noise of cheering was deafening, but as most of the men gathered were rather uncouth adventurers, the sound came off as that of starving dogs being fed, not that she disliked that. Having a tavern atmosphere in such a posh ballroom was part of the fun.

“Do you see all of that metal outside? Hah? Try and tell me now that somebody who has all of those in her possession is not on a path to glory!”

Another round of uproar ensued.

Warlords largely commanded their own following and supplemented that with conscription, not to mention the crew that must be paid for running the war machines and especially the ships, but from time to time adventurers, paid from spoils, were recruited whenever a large enough campaign was afoot. What was different this time was the adventurers were supplied by the government of Treverorum—who usually rewarded such adventurers on a commission basis for fighting warlords.

“In the end, of course, it is all about the glory. The honor! And I guarantee you valiant heroes right now, you chose the right cause. Fighting for the Leaf is fighting for glory!”

The crowd thundered. Athos had to cover his ears. It was easy to get carried away in the excitement, but somehow Taran had the presence of mind to note: I thought it was the Caesar who picked us for you.

The warlord raised her hands and basked in the tumult, swaying lightly as if to some tune only she can hear. The bodyguards were already holding her back to keep her from toppling off the balcony, but she pushed them back and kept swaying. This public display went on for something like five whole minutes, and it felt like it went on for ten.

For a moment it looked as if Four-Leaf will add something to further rouse the passions of the crowd, but then she has already decided that the thing about glory was the right place to end the speech, so she just waved a gloved hand to the orchestra and retreated out of sight to signal the start of the festivities.

“Look at this!” beamed Taran at Athos. “Roe! Real, actual roe!” She plunged a spoon into the bowl and savored. “Mm-hm-hm!”

“Come on, use your own spoon, will ‘ya?” He ladled some onto his trencher bread and moved on somewhat absent-minded to the other side dishes.

“You think milady shall throw another party like this if we win the war?”

“That’s asking a bit much, methinks. We will have the loot.”

“But milady is taking half of all spoils, I hear. It’s only right she give us another banquet.”

“You actually want one of the Big Five to oblige your earthly cravings, huh?”

Loud guffaw. “But of course!” She dashed over to the table that held the desserts, including the largest chocolate fountain she ever saw in her life. “Would you look at that!” And she melted into a hopeless fawning over the heap of sweets.

“You won’t get anywhere if you stay that way,” said Athos. Sigh. “I can tell you will be drunk before this hour is done from that behavior. Remember, we are deploying tomorrow afternoon.”

She was taken aback. “Hueh!? Already?!”

“Didn’t Trawitz say we were rushed here because Five-Moon was already on the move from last week?”

She took some of the pastries onto her plate, and one large piece into her mouth. “Everybody will still be in a hangover,” she said whilst chewing. Gulp. “Well… some guys might recover by afternoon.” She washed down the bread with beer. “And I’m one of them.”

Athos only puffed, not quite convinced. “To think that there has to be a party the night before.”

“Come on! Milady knows her people in and out. She is boosting our morale for battle! No one will fight for you if you start all glum, if we are on a tough mission, having fun is a must!”

Athos let his head fall onto his shoulder. “What exactly did we come here for, anyway, to fight or to pig out?”

“To pig out, of course! Look, you think a proper warlord could get first-class adventurers like us to fight for them if they don’t have the, you know, wherewithal to indulge us? This one, this milady, she is not shy to show off for the sake of us grunts. I can fight for her forever!”

Well… that much was obvious, but…

There was no way they can claim any of that indulgence now after yesterday’s performance.

The dew was still thick on the ground and the morning star blazed ahead of dawn when Taran roused and made ready to leave. There were no signs of anyone coming after them, or of anyone at all, for that matter. She felt a heaviness in her chest. They will be on their own today.

She downed the already cold soup her comrade did not take last night and refilled the mug with the warm contents from the thermos. “Aths,” she said gently rubbing his cheek. “Ath. Come on. Breakfast is ready. You gotta fill up.” She raised her eyes once again over the field. “We got a long trip waiting.”

It was uncomfortably warm as early as eight in the morning. Carrying Athos on her back and the gear in front was no joke, and she had to stop to catch her breath every so often. She tried to walk in the shadow of embankments, dikes, whatever trees were standing in the open space to escape the sun. By around ten, the heat was unbearable. They sheltered in a copse where they consumed the rest of the soup and tried to recover their strength. At about two in the afternoon, she resumed the trek, hoping to find someplace to spend the night later.

Taran’s eyes narrowed in the heat as she spied what seemed to be a barn at the foot of the hill in the distance. She looked back, agitated at Athos’ profuse sweating on the makeshift stretcher she crafted from the tarp, and was now dragging behind her. “I found something, bud. Stay with me, OK?”

She dragged her comrade further on and laid him on the ground where it was shaded by the grassy east-facing bank from the afternoon sun. She then continued on to the barn, which, upon her closer approach, proved to be more of a warehouse or oversized tool shed. There were no windows, but the structure itself was partly sunk into the earth, surrounded by a low, withered hedge. The roof was of half-corroded sheeting and studded with weeds.

She pushed past the dilapidated wooden gate and stepped down into the narrow yard. On the wall to her left was a single hole, almost large enough to poke her hand into. She recognized it as the work of an antitank round; she noticed the slight opening in the hedge where it went through. There was no sign that it went off, there was no other hole or crack. Great. There was a dud in their would-be home for tonight.

She regarded the door. It was shuttered and looked quite heavy. How exactly is she going to force through—

GARRRRRHHHH—!

Gasp—!

Her reflex got her a timber fragment in response to the rabid growling—which ended up stuck in the maw of a huge… mastiff? What is something like this doing here?! There must be somebody who looked after this place and left this creature behind to guard the place. How often was it fed? Did it even eat today? Seems not at all, as the foaming jaw began to crush the wood, splinters flying off.

“The remnants fought on courageously, some would say recklessly, in the face of the certain death,” the instructor of her marksmanship training group had once told them. “Losing their spears, they fought with their swords. Losing their swords, they fought with their bare hands and teeth.”

There was no choice.

She wrestled the thing to the ground and made for the throat, which she clamped down on hard with her own teeth. In a short while, the dog was convulsing.

Taran got up and retched out the blood and fat. She looked down on the beast; the timber was still locked in its mouth… and then she began to tear up all of a sudden. “I’m sorry, baby,” she sobbed, kneeling and hugging the lifeless form. When she had first set out from Treverorum, about a year before she even met Athos, the guild lady who manned the counter and quest board noticed her youth and grilled her a bit about what she thought she was getting herself into.

“Everything will be out to mutilate ‘ya, kid. Can you handle that?”

“Well… Isn’t that what bad guys do anyways? Of course I won't let them.”

Snort. “You fine with killing someone?”

Hmmm… She did get into a brawl once and even got mugged at a backdoor somewhere, which she fought off. Yeah, she can manage. “If somebody jumped at me with a knife, I would knife back, for sure.”

Fair enough. “Can you be a sharpshooter?”

Huh?

“I mean, you will probably learn to be a good shot in a couple months, but are you fine shooting somebody who was just walking down minding his own business… who didn’t even know you were there?”

“…”

“What about a guy who was just having dinner by the campfire? Or even asleep? Are you OK shooting them if those were your orders?”

She found herself tongue-tied for once. The woman did not wait on her. “Son, listen here. You gotta have your priorities. Those fellas were gunna mow you and your party down if you let them go. It’s not like you get a kick out of murdering people, but you will run into a choice somewhere. Would you rather see your buddies dead?”

“It’s not like I want this,” she sniffled as she kept hugging the dog. “You’re a good boy, aren’t ‘ya? Protecting your place and all… Good boy… Good boy…”

She lay like that for a long while. Before she knew it, the shadows on the veldt had grown longer and were falling on her.

She wrapped the dog’s head and paws in cloth and buried those five feet in a hole in the yard. With the same crowbar she dug the grave with, she pried the door open; turned out it was locked in by just one skinny bar. The rest of the animal she washed in a nearby brook and cut up to be tonight’s dinner.