Chapter 7

The government of Ozhakoland sent in the autumn of the year 8268 an expeditionary force of ten thousand out of the hundred thousand in their army rolls. Many were conscripts with only basic drill training and had to be fielded in platoons of at least fifty each to be of any consequence. Of the hundred and twenty such units, ten have already crossed the bridge, thirty were already about to, and the rest were massed in a large camp along the road from Assonda Circle.

For a conflict that was seen at the time as simply between the government and some bandits, none of the Sisters saw any reason to involve themselves, although after an urgent entreaty from the President, Four-Leaf agreed to lend one mechanized column, which so far has not shown up on the field. The emperor at Treverorum did not send anything at all, save for the Fifth Fleet which was simply told to position itself off the west coast of Freidaland, with a forward base ready to receive them at the naval station of Klara, midway from the Lost Bridge to the mouth of the seaway, on the Freidaland side.

Hoen and Taran, as civilian agents of the census, were assigned to stay with one of the larger units, Platoon XVIII, two hundred strong. There was no other adventurer amongst anyone in camp, and nobody knew Taran was one. But Port Lilan had furnished the unit with five trucks and some twenty motorcycles, all somewhat fitted to go offroad if need be, provisions to last a month, and even a makeshift field kitchen.

This platoon was the first of the second wave of troops to cross the Lost Bridge into Freidaland. Taran would remember that moment. She sat atop the roof of a truck to get a good view whilst the column rumbled over the bridge. The sea was magnificent. The drive across was glorious, it felt like an hour long. But then they got to other side… They were now gone from the land of the living. She felt a certain silence wash over her as the veldt of another world took over the scene all around her. But that was all. At the back of her mind, she thought that very moment should have wholly taken her breath away… but in the end, it was just veldt all the same. Why the letdown? Could it be that she was merely ferried over into Freidaland instead of her stepping onto the dirt of the unregenerate waste on her own two feet? Maybe she should have just hitched a ride on a bike to be closer to the ground?

The show of force seem to have worked. The first week after entering Freidaland, Hoen and Taran, unhindered, were hard at work mapping out the terrain around wherever their platoon was camping, with input from the vanguard units who were probably half a day ahead of them already. There were no reports of anything untoward. After that first week, there were only sightings of raider groups eyeing them from afar.

“In any case,” said the platoon sergeant one night as they dined at the mess tent, “You two be extra careful now. The savages might be scared by our numbers, but there’s no telling if they will throw some mischief at us at our lowest guard. Kidnapping civilian followers will definitely complicate our operations.”

Taran only snickered to herself. Must she tell them now that she fought under Four-Leaf? There was still the issue of Hoen, though, but if what he had said back at Sud about mounting a defense at the inn had any substance… Perhaps she could cover him if he stays put in camp.

She was startled at Hoen laying a hand on her shoulder. As if reading her mind, he said, “You will be my guardian angel, OK?”

“Ah—Hueh!? That’s a bit overboard, don’t you think?”

The sergeant laughed it off. “I am sure you know the basics of shooting, or else the census wouldn’t have told you to come with us. This is still the land of the dead, after all.”

Late into the following day, their unit encountered their first river in the wilderness, which had been labeled the Wettar or Weatar in the old map. The vanguard parties had found fording spots further upstream, but the commander ordered the quick construction of a pontoon bridge where the battalion stood. In the meantime, Hoen and Taran explored the region along the river.

She was surprised to find individual homesteads dotting the landscape as they left the more secluded region facing the Lost Bridge. There were no villages like Balkha, but aside from that it felt much like herder country in Ozhakoland. Many families fled the advance of the army, leaving empty houses without anything that they surmised the troops would plunder, and those who remained were armed. But none of the people seemed to have anything to do, or liked very much, the raiders that had passed through their lands to Ozhakoland as those were also seen as a despoiling army. Well, at least with the XVIII, with a more open-minded platoon commander and sergeant who ordered restraint with the civilians, encounters with the locals were much less tense, and in a few days the people who fled began to return little by little. Soon after, the natives were gathering round the camp, offering produce for the army’s coins, gas, and medicine.

“The cheese is really good here,” remarked Taran as she munched on the goat curds she and Hoen got in exchange for their warlord coins. Even more helpful are the guides who accompanied them as they mapped the land all the way down to the large creek they called the Semeret, with an abundance of furious notes by Hoen on the lore the guides constantly threw at them.

“Say, Hoen,” mused Taran one night by the campfire, “we ar’nt the first people to map this place… are we?”

“We are.” He guzzled down the pea-and-veal soup. “With all that dead-land attitude the government held for years and years, we would be the first to actually chart this country as it really is on the ground.”

“But the advance parties should have some idea of the sort of country they were entering, right?”

Slurp. “Treverorum did photograph this land from the air.” Smack. “Back in the day there were some pirate raids on the oil shipped by Three-Lands…”

“You mean Three-Nine.”

“That’s what the others call her. Three-Lands once even dubbed herself Three-Gems. Anyway… Three-Lands had seized gold and other mines that once belonged to the Golden Horde, to fund her military buildup back in Quintia during a really tense year with the other Sisters. Then, there were pirates, perhaps the same people behind the raids of late, who made a killing on the lightly guarded tankers as the security was focused on the mineral cargo. It wasn’t long before they were targeting the gold.

“As you know, warlords are typically good on land forces at the expense of sea and air. I doubt even Four-Leaf would send out her measly two ships unless there was all-out war. The empire was the go-to for that.

“Three-Lands asked the caesar for help. The Sixth Fleet was deployed, and they resolved to send bombers to the raider-held city of Blomfontein. There were pictures relevant to enemy movements on the ground and nothing more.

“In any case, the pirate attacks stopped for as long as the fleet was there. The warlord and Treverorum later fell out, and that was the end of the mineral ventures. But we got the photos, at least. They pieced together what they saw from the air, and we got the, um… semi-map of Freidaland.”

Which was a rather bare affair, showing a handful of rivers, forested and open areas, and the outlines of the coast down to the Bridge. A handful of recon flights from Four-Leaf added some more rivers and hills, including the Wettar they just crossed, to the country leading back to the Bridge. The only other notable landmark was a long highway that cut across the land and led straight to Blomfontein, called the Trans-Freida Highway or simply the Trans, which was now used as the reference point of the army invading Freidaland.

The XXV, which was among the very first to cross over the Bridge, had finally caught sight of the Trans as their second month in the wilderness has just begun. With it came disturbing news: large contingents of the enemy were standing along the length of the highway, eyeing the army from afar. Then came sightings of raiding parties well behind the vanguard, close to the rear of the XIII and XXXIV. The situation alarmed the platoon commander enough to order his unit to split in two in the coming week. Hoen and Taran were to stay in different halves.

And then…

“Well, I can’t…”

Was the general mood following some ghastly discoveries.

Mutilated body parts were found nailed to trees and posts everywhere in the path of the army, particularly the XVII and the XXXI. This seemed meant to scare the troopers, but more of them were enraged than frightened. The victims must be innocent villagers. There were rumors that the savages killed some of their own to provide the corpses, although it only made them even more despicable.

What was more disturbing, however, were some weapons caches found in bushes or dug up from shallow, hastily-buried pits. What exactly were the implications of this? Were the enemies preparing for them long in advance? Have they already organized even before the military crossed the bridge? Were there hidden parties the army had actually passed over unawares?

Shortly after this, reports of skirmishes began to filter in. None of the encounters were conclusive so far, there were mostly hit-and-run attacks, as if the enemy was simply testing the invading force. More than that, however, the raiders were able to leave behind a sense of uncertainty and skittishness in the ranks of the army.

Not improving the situation were the howling of wild dogs every night. Taran’s platoon had returned to an uninhabited part of the land, and the bayings here on the other side of the seaway were louder, more often, more threatening than any back in Ozhakoland. She could not sleep. What a time to lose Hoen.

She got up and stepped outside her tent with the radio. As expected, she was having trouble getting a signal. But she had nothing to do, anyway. Even just the act of reaching out to a buddy was oddly comforting in this hostile wilderness, the land of the dead.

Crackle…

“…”

Crackle…

“Copy…? Copy please?”

Crackle…

He must be asleep. But then, can anyone sleep will all that baying? The guys in the other tent were still up, and they sound anxious. Come on, Hoen. Hah… This attempt at contact was fast becoming tedious. Huff… Oh well. There was nothing else she could think of to pass the time. She remembered the lullaby she sang to Athos in that shed. Oh, Ath. If only he could hear her. Still, if she can’t reach out to him anymore, then she will carry his memory, honor him, sing about him for the rest of her life.

She breathed into the radio… and began.

Oh… the shine of my eyes

Ohhh laughter of my heart

Oh, the ring in my voice

Will you… Will you

look my way once?

She was singing with her eyes shut, so absorbed was she in the music and the memories. She would open her eyes to a teary haze, but just smile through it and go on. As Athos would have had it.

He loved that smile of hers. So much.

There was one time, back in Aquileia, when Athos confessed to her as a joke. She landed a heavy blow to his gut to impress on him that she was a guy. He never dared bring it up thereafter.

Crackle….

To her surprise, the radio began to buzz from the other end of the line. “H-hello?” went a sleepy voice. Ah— So Hoen was already asleep, after all. “Is that you, kid?”

“…”

“I thought it was a pleasant surprise to have a station here in the wild. Hm? Did the station just sign off soon as I talked to it? Hello?”

“Uhhhh, no. It’s just me.”

“Figures. Lad, rough riders like us shouldn’t be inclined to girly stuff like love songs.”

“Wha… I-I was just singing a song. D’ya even have to comment on something like this?”

“OK, OK! Can’t blame you being mushy right now, I guess, you must be homesick.”

“Wait, it’s not mushy! It’s my favorite, got a problem with that?”

“Ohhhh-K. I won’t complain anymore. It’s not like your singing is bad, anyway. I was already awake, you know, I legit thought you were a music station. Good job, I guess?”

“…”

“Hey, that was a compliment.”

“…”

“Taran?”

“Ar’nt the wolves bothering you?”

Uh, that? Chuckle. “So you hear them, too, eh? Welp, can’t help it. The land is raw. Wildlife is an integral part of the landscape, I don’t see why it should bother me.”

“Will you say that of the enemy, as well? They are part of this land, too.”

“Why… yes I will. As soon as they stop attacking us, of course.”

“What if they don’t stop?”

“Whoa, whoa, what are you even saying? They gonna stop, of course, that’s what the army’s for.”

“Sorry. Must be overthinking it. Let’s change the topic, shall we?”

“You’re the one who started this talk. You do the driving.”

Alright? Then… Sigh. “You think the Bensons or anyone we left behind will welcome us back if we return? I mean, they must be taking us for dead, now that we’re here.”

“Heh. Some question, that. Folks will have to shun all of these troopers right here if that were the case. Will they do that for real? The state will have us back, for sure, Karl will have us, he’s counting on us to finish our mission.”

“But maybe half of all the people back home will shun us.” She remembered Mr. Benson. “The people and the state don’t agree on everything, do they?”

She heard him snort. “That may be true…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

Must be hard if Benson won’t accept you.”

She could not answer for a moment. And then, “I know they will take you back.”

“Nope. Am not returning there. I have a world to see after this mission. Karl did not really give details, did he? You read the letter, it’s basically ‘Map as much as you can while you are with the army.’ Which means as soon as the war is over, I’m quitting. You don’t miss civilization, lad?”

“Uhhhh…”

“When I come back, it won’t be to Lilan. Say, lad, you been to Treverorum, right? Tell me what it’s like.”

“Huh? Well, uh, there’s too many details to mention. All I know is that it’s the biggest city on earth.”

“That much is expected. Come on, tell me the stuff I don’t know.”

“Bah, I told you there’s too much! I didn’t radio you to deliver a lecture, I just wanted to make sure you’re alright.”

“Pfft. If you won’t tell me, then I better tuck in. Nighty-night.”

“OK. Over and out.”

“Oh yes—could you sing another song?”

“Heh—!? Really now! You’re making me your nanny just because I refused to be your teacher. I thought you said I didn’t want me to sing girly music.”

“Not to me. There are guys sleeping with me in the tent, they got girls left behind, and they miss them. Come on, do it. Like a good comrade.”

Taran’s annoyance was quickly supplanted by tenderness. These guys. Being out here among the beasts when they would rather be home in the arms of their women. If only she could also have somewhere to return to. But then… She took a deep breath.

Her voice rang loud and clear over the radio in that tent. The troopers walking past stopped in their tracks and gathered outside. Hoen’s tent became a campfire where everyone could huddle round to warm their spirits.

Taran finally got sleepy enough after that vocal exertion and saying a sweet good night to everyone in the tent.

She was still laying in bed with her face in a pillow when the dappled sunshine leaked into her tent. But that was not what awakened her. There were hurrying footfalls inside and outside. For a little while she just stared at the commotion, trying to register the first bits of the day from her senses, but was jolted by one of the younger troopers who barged inside. “Kid, we’re moving! We got company!”

She still could not quite bring herself to get up on the spot, so the soldier yanked her up by the scruff and dragged her along. It was only when she saw for herself the rush and the agitation for herself that her mind switched on and she broke free. “What exactly is going on?!”

“Raiders! They’re coming. Get on the truck now!”

And at that point, she saw one truck drive away with a motorcycle escort, whilst her erstwhile tent was packed up and loaded into the other jampacked lorry. The other three were with Hoen’s half of the platoon. Before long, she and a bunch of stragglers were scrambling two or three each with their rifles on the four remaining bikes.

“Can you drive this?” said the trooper putting a soldier’s helmet on her head and a pistol in her hand.

No. She had so far only ridden on four wheels or on a saddle, but she did see her fellow adventurers drive these things, so she had a bit of an idea how they work. “You can’t?”

He shook his head.

But there was no time to argue. She straddled the bike with the man behind her, holding on to the bars. “Do you kick this?” she asked him.

“That black thing on your right foot.”

She did so, and the thing burst into action as though suddenly possessed, as though it was suddenly alive. “So it’s just like a horse…” She twisted the throttle and it only made noise. “Hey isn’t this supposed to run now?” She stepped on the gear and the bike jumped forward into a bumpy ride—like a bronco. It gave her a quick thrill, it really is a horse. She pressed the brake, it halted, yes yes, the reins. She stepped on the gear again, and the going was easier. In the heat of escape, Taran figured everything out quickly.

“Keep following that one ahead!” the man yelled above the noise. “We should meet up with the platoon in an hour.” But oh it was a rough, rough ride. They nearly stumbled quite a few times, but Taran’s legs quickly anchored them both. The man was astonished at her strength, still not realizing she was an adventurer. She for her part actually enjoyed planting her feet every so often, whooping, laughing, it felt a lot more like she was riding something on four legs. This kid is unbelievable, he thought.

“Yeehaha!

“Woooooo!”

The trooper looked scandalized. “Are you one of ‘em, kid!? Quit yakkin—Whoa!”

The bike has just rushed straight into the dry scrub earning themselves quite a few scratches. The moment they got out into the open, he realized that their pursuers were gone. This kid seemed to know what she was doing. But they also lost the comrade they were tailing. He wanted to upbraid his driver for the oversight, but they were going really fast now and he’d rather not spoil the bumpy fun of the ride while they were still at large with those savages.

The trooper began to radio the others as soon as the ride got smooth enough. “The XII and the XXX have been ambushed,” he informed Taran. The XIX and XXXII are currently engaging. We have no idea whether there are other enemies or where they are. We gotta join up. It’s our only chance!”

To their consternation, they spied fountains of dirt kicked up by bullets to their right. There were two pursuers, one on horse and another on a beat-up bike. There must be others close by, probably eight or ten more. Taran didn’t care. She stepped on the highest gear and drove over the undulating land; this was nothing like the rugged ground from earlier. Her quick, experienced eyes caught the shadows of sudden hollows or bumps which she purposely drove around to put them between her and the enemy in the hopes they would trip. They didn’t, they knew the lay of the land better than her. To make things worse, the rest of their raider party, all on horse, appeared to the left, riding in from the west. The trooper pointed his rifle in their general direction with one arm whilst clinging for dear life with the other. There was no way he can be sure of hitting anything with that single grip, let alone at full auto, but he blasted away nonetheless. The recoil knocked the gun out of his grip and off the bike. Tch!

“You see them?” he shouted above the wind.

“Nada!”

Instead, they were soon confronted with a steep rise up ahead. Taran was still confident she could clear the hill at full speed, but then she realized a bit too late that they had been trapped. If she was on a horse, the animal might have turned away and looked for a path up the hill on its own, but being in charge of the bike, Taran had no one to blame but herself. Still in high gear, the motorcycle sputtered out as it struggled uphill, and the two of them had no choice but to slide back down just as the enemy was already closing in.

One of them in particular raced ahead of the party on his steed, carrying a long lance, intending to deal a swift coup de grâce after seeing the rifle fall off the bike of their quarry. But Taran had a knack for quick thinking. She doffed her helmet and flung at it full force straight at the oncoming blade. The thing split in two, but the force of the throw deflected the spear and blunted the charge of the horse just as it came close. Now! Taran drew her pistol and shot the masked man off the horse.

“Get off the bike now!” she yelled at the trooper, and they both quickly swapped wheels with hooves, Taran whistling and whoa-ing and taking the reins. They both managed to climb onto the saddle and ride off just as the rest of the raiders were arriving on the scene.

The mount, which had proved faster than the rest in that charge from earlier, soon outran the enemy. They lost them within the hour.