“Do you follow them when the formation is challenged?”
“I follow my company and will get my chance to fight.”
“Where is the strategy in that? Why don’t you pretend to break and then collapse as you bring soldiers from the back or sides to bottle the enemy up or something like that.”
The lieutenant laughed. “Why would we do that? We are superior to the Gussellians in every way. We will not break. We will succeed.”
Quint wondered if the awful stew had been laced with hubris. He thought that was the right word. Overconfidence. The last battle against the Barellians had resulted in a draw. Did this lieutenant know that?”
“Were you involved in the Barellian battle a few months ago?” Quint asked.
“Another glorious Racellian victory,” the lieutenant said.
Quint kept his mouth shut from that point on. He was stuck with observing the battle, but he would do so from a distance, and he’d suggest Amaria do the same.
The rest of the evening consisted of listening to the lieutenant’s companies tell stories of previous victories amidst a lot of bragging.
“Do you have these incursions often?” Quint asked.
The lieutenant shrugged. “All the time. They usually end with both sides claiming victory.”
“Do the boundaries ever change?” Quint asked.
The lieutenant looked confused. “Of course not. They keep our enemies from invading. We spank them, or they spank us.”
Quint was surprised by the results of keeping soldiers in camps for no visible results. How did the strategic operations division deal with a lack of success?
Amaria stopped Quint as soldiers finished their day by checking the equipment they would bring into battle.
Quint would bring the practice sword he’d been given at the beginning of the day. It didn’t have much of an edge, and Quint was competent at sharpening if nothing else.
He placed the sword on the ground outside his tent while his tentmate snored inside and cast the sharpening string at the sword. A mist enveloped the weapon and drifted away with the breeze.
Quint lifted the sword and grabbed a broken rope tossed into a box of broken things. His face brightened into a smile as the sword’s edge had no trouble cutting the rope in two. He wasn’t much of a swordsman, but if he lost his magic, Quint had a backup plan, and from what he saw in the morning, wizards weren’t great swordsmen.
Amaria stood in the back of the wizard corps lined up in their designated section on the left of the battle line. Quint was farther back, sitting on his horse to the left of the high officers mounted on the rise on the edge of the Racellian side of the field, directing the battle. His eyes were on the wizard corps, but then his eyes kept moving over the battlefield.
Trumpets blared and the Racellian army took a step forward and then another until drums picked up the cadence. The enemy on the other side of the large field began to advance. Their cadence differed, but Quint could see the Gussellian wizard corps facing their Racellian counterparts.
Quint suddenly felt exposed, mounted on his horse with no one around. He cast a shield thread with as much power as he dared and felt more secure. As the inevitable clash was still minutes away, Quint wove a portent string and looked at an overlay of the battlefield. Two large contingents of Gusellian soldiers appeared on either side of the battleground and overcame the Racellian army. The scene shifted to the Gussellians ordering their troops and marching into Racellian territory.
His vision wasn’t one of a draw but of a stunning defeat. Quint didn’t trust the string but couldn’t ignore what he saw and urged his horse onto the battlefield.
“It’s going to be a rout,” Quint told Amaria. “Racellia loses, and we are exposed. I’m leaving, and you are invited. We don’t have to throw away our lives, not here and not now.”
Amaria’s eyes widened. “You cast a portent?”
Quint nodded. “I trust it enough to take precautions. Come back up with me to the battle commanders, and if Gusellian soldiers appear on both flanks, we must flee.”
“Your cowardice is showing,” Amaria said, but Quint could see her blush. She was thinking.
“I’ll be up there. We probably won’t have time to get our bags.”
“I didn’t bring anything that can’t be replaced except for me,” Amaria said. “You really saw defeat?”
Quint nodded. “Doesn’t the wizard corps cast portent strings for the army?”
“They don’t believe them,” Amaria said. “Father has said portents aren’t accurate enough and have cost lives in the past.”
Quint thought that was interesting since Amaria said her father had cast a portent string into Quint’s future, and the general seemed to believe it.
“I’m not going to ignore what I saw, at least not yet. I learned that portents get less accurate over time, but I’m only looking an hour or less into the future,” Quint said.
Amaria looked at the wizards in front of her and then back at the row of officers on the slight rise that led into the woods.
“It won’t hurt to observe the battlefield better from up there,” Amaria said.
Quint nodded. They watched the developing battle for half an hour, and then there was yelling to their right. Gusellian soldiers emerged from the woods.
“Time to leave,” Quint said.
Amaria’s eyes grew as her gaze was transfixed on the attacking enemy. Quint took her reins and led her away from the battle.
“Have you seen enough?” one of the officers said.
“I don’t think you will win the day,” Quint said as he trotted past them back toward the camp.
