Peculiar Soul

The tortoise was at the pond for a drink one day when he noticed the man staring down into the water. The man did not move while the tortoise came and went, and he thought it so strange that he mentioned it to the mockingbird when they next spoke.

The tortoise asked what made the man stare at the water so.

The mockingbird replied that the man was not staring at the water, but at what he saw in it.

This irritated the tortoise, who knew that man saw his reflection in the water, and he said as much to the mockingbird. The mockingbird replied that it was not his reflection that the man stared at either. It was what he saw in the water that captivated the man’s attention so.

Frustrated, the tortoise asked what the man saw in the water aside from his own reflection.

The mockingbird replied that there are things in the minds of men that exist only there, that are more dear to them than anything in the world. He told the tortoise never to interrupt a man who has caught a glimpse in truth of something that ought to dwell only within his mind, for men treasure such glimpses beyond reason.

The tortoise said that it seemed foolish to treasure something that could not be felt or touched. The mockingbird agreed, but said that men still caught hope on occasion that such things could not only be touched - but grasped, kept, and obtained.

If the tortoise ever saw a man that lifted his eyes from the water and still saw hope, the mockingbird warned, he should keep far away.

- Pre-Gharic Ardan manuscript, vellum, c. 500 PE

His short stay at the hospital would have been perfect for a nap, Michael reflected, if naps were still an option for him. Instead he stayed by Amira and thought - about what she said, about his failings as an anatomens. About the fight with Friedrich. The memories prickled his skin with gooseflesh even now, and he rubbed his hand absentmindedly over the fresh skin on his arm, wrapping himself in Stanza’s comforting glow, calling upon the warmth of his low souls-

He paused. That warmth had grown, since last he looked. Some had come to him during the shelling the night before, certainly, but it was only a handful; now there were a round dozen more of them quietly flaring away within him. His thoughts slipped into incoherence as he focused inward, unbelieving. He had been focused on the battle, but to miss a new low soul entirely was unprecedented.

Yet the ones that had come the other night had done so with only a trickle of warmth to mark their passage; it was not so strange to think that he might have missed such a thing in the middle of fighting. Nor was it beyond belief that these might have come with even less notice than that. Indeed, he had felt the warmth swell in his chest as he approached the hospital, but dismissed it as the sign of dying men-

Which he supposed it had been.

Michael sat on the cot, staring at the imagined glow for a long time.

Eventually the medic brought back his senior, who looked Michael over before turning his attention to the Great Shield. The junior medic promptly shooed him out of the hospital, grumbling when Michael thanked him.

Absent an obvious destination, Michael called on Sobriquet. She guided him to where Lars, Zabala and the men were assembled. Richter had given in to his stew-making compulsion once more, and they huddled around the anemic cookfire clutching small bowls of whatever he had managed to scrounge.

Zabala looked up at his approach, raising an eyebrow. “You seem to have had a fun time.”

Michael looked down, surveying the ruins of his clothing. He was almost as frightening a figure as Amira, save for the small clean patch where the medic had healed his arm. “Fun is one word for it,” he sighed. “I don’t suppose there’s a bath in camp.”

“If there is, they haven’t told us about it,” Lars said, his mouth half-full of food. “Keep it on, I say - you look frightful.”

Sobriquet gave him an unimpressed look. “Overruled,” she said. “Or he’s finding a different cot.” She raised her arm towards the far end of the tent row. “There’s a small station there. The water is freezing, but that shouldn’t be an issue for you.”

Michael nodded gratefully and jogged towards the artificed building she had indicated; it turned out to have a cistern on the roof, which fed showers beneath. It was packed with men in the aftermath of the battle, weary and manic men methodically freeing the evidence of the day from their skin. They all looked miserable; Michael realized why when he stripped off his tattered clothing and stood beneath a free showerhead. Being a potens rendered the cold less of an issue, but made it no more pleasant.

He closed his eyes and drew his focus up to the water, briefly stealing heat from the rocks beneath them until the water was acceptably warm. Shouts of joy came up as the water began to steam; Michael smiled and went to work on his horrendous appearance.

A short while later he rejoined the group, having managed to beg a spare uniform from the other men showering; once he offered to top off the water’s heat again, he had been offered his pick from the clothing there. He had chosen a standard Safid infantryman’s uniform, for its fit and cleanliness, and tugged at it as he rejoined the others around the cookfire.

Lars did a double-take at seeing him in the clothes, his lips curving into a grin. “My word, you’ve gone native,” he said. “I know they’re keen on you here, but I never thought they’d convince you to enlist.”

“It may surprise you to learn that the variety of clothing in a military camp is somewhat limited,” Michael sighed, settling down in an open spot around the fire. “It fits, and it’s not full of holes. That’s about all I care about at the moment.”

“You forgot to mention clean,” Sobriquet said, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek. “Which I appreciate. I take it Amira is recuperating?”

Michael waggled his fingers. “She’s in rough shape. It’s hard to injure potentes, but hard to heal them as well. I got the impression she was in for at least some recovery - and she’s never getting that hand back.”

“I’ve always been a trendsetter, but that’s a bit too much,” Sobriquet snorted. “And it leaves us with the problem of what to do next. With their commander and most powerful soul unavailable, the Safid will be immobile for some time. Meanwhile the Ardans are regrouping in the mountains, and Luc is still presumably playing with Saleh out west.”

“Or he’s killed Taskin,” Zabala pointed out, “and is coming over here with a fresh new soul to tear us apart.”

Michael nodded, frowning. “Either way, sitting around isn’t what we need to be doing. We need to get to Luc. If he’s not going to meet us here, then it’s on us to track him down.”

“So let’s go,” Zabala grunted. “Do we have any actual confirmation that he’s out west, or is that merely process of elimination?”

“The latter,” Michael admitted, scratching his neck. “Amira didn’t seem to have any actual reports from that side of the front, but if Luc isn’t here-”

“Then he’s not here.” Zabala countered. “That’s about all you can say conclusively, and even that is suspect since he’s been such a sneaky bastard in the past.” He drank the last of his tea, then peered out around the camp. “We should find whatever passes for an intelligence division here and use your status to wring what we can out of them. Then we leave.”

Michael nodded hesitantly, following Zabala’s gaze; the camp was teeming with men in the wake of the battle, some of them wounded but most surprisingly well-off. The battle had been much easier than it might have been thanks to Amira and Michael intervening. Without either-

Sobriquet’s eyes narrowed. “I know that look,” she murmured. “You’re thinking idiotic thoughts.”

“Even if Luc isn’t here, Friedrich and Sofia pose their own kind of threat. Without us they’d have had their run of the Safid lines. Without any of the Eight on their side, the Safid won’t fare well against the Ardans, diminished or not.” Michael turned to meet her eyes, all too conscious of the burgeoning warmth within him. “I told them they’d have to trust me once this was over, if we wanted to avoid another War. Helping them now may mean I don’t have to kill them later.”

“I’m in favor,” Lars said loudly. “Same arguments as before; these are good lads and the men they’re fighting are bastards. Would sit poorly with me to let them get torn up.”

“And what about the ‘good lads’ over on Taskin’s side?” Zabala asked. “No doubt they’re standing against similar odds, not to mention similar bastards.”

“True, but we’re here right now.” Lars drank the dregs from his bowl and set it down with a shrug. “We know the situation. The Ardan troops are weakened, they’ve just done a forced retreat. Sever and Sibyl are here. Taking them out will let us concentrate on Luc without distractions, and we’re going to appreciate that when the time comes.”

Zabala shook his head. “That’s a lot of words to say you’re not ready to stop killing Swordsmen.”

“Too right,” Lars growled. “But that doesn’t mean it’s not the best way forward.”

“You think it’d be best to charge into the mountains with our little band to go up against the rest of the Ardan army? With two of the Eight, and all manner of ensouled? They were hard-hit, Lars, not destroyed.” Zabala raised his eyebrow. “There are still thousands of them.”

“There are still thousands of us,” Lars retorted. “Who said anything about going alone? Michael’s got pull here. If he wanted to lead a force up to the mountains, I’m betting he’d get a force to follow him.” He gave Michael a wink. “You could probably make it official if you promised the scary lady a proper snog.”

“We’re trying not to get him killed,” Sobriquet sighed. “But I have to agree; if you’re going to insist on protecting the Safid, then it’s only right that they should help out. And if they don’t want to help - then we can leave with a clear conscience.”

Michael drummed his fingers on his leg, frowning at the thought. He couldn’t deny that help would be useful, but the thought of drawing others into a dangerous, uncertain plan set a chill in his spine. A token force of volunteers wouldn’t go amiss, though, if it soothed Sobriquet’s objections…

He shook his head. “Fine. I don’t expect many of them will be eager to leave the line, but if a few feel like braving the danger then we’ll brave it with them. If they all feel that they can handle the Ardans from here, then we’ll let them.”

Sobriquet’s eyes narrowed. “You know I can tell when you’re lying,” she said. “You have no intention of leaving.”

Michael gave her a smile. “If Lars is right, I won’t need to,” he said. “Don’t you trust Lars?”

She gave him a flat look.

Airing his need for a few volunteers in the camp was a simple exercise, in practice; the men simply walked around loudly discussing Michael’s intention to pursue the Ardans, and the Safid gift for quiet circulation of news meant that everyone knew before his hair had dried from the shower.

The next part turned out to be much harder. Michael let his sight drift up higher, taking in the crowd of Safid soldiers waiting in the camp’s main mustering area. It was not a mob, milling about in the afternoon sunlight; the Safid officers had come to some sort of understanding amid the rumor and hearsay. Men waited in their ranks.

Too many men in too many ranks. He had expected a few to show, for in any group of men there would be those with more daring than sense. But before he knew it a company had formed, then two. By the time the fourth company had formed Michael was staring in disbelief, his heart pounding as he silently willed the rest to stay away.

Eventually, the flow of men dwindled. Nearly a full battalion of Safid stood in the mustering area, expectant, their veiled eyes looking to Michael.

“Well,” Sobriquet murmured. “Here’s your few men.”

He gave her a pained look. “It’s too many,” Michael hissed. “I wanted a handful of volunteers. Not - all this.”

“You presented them with a test, Michael, what did you think they were going to do?” she asked, exasperated. “They live for shit like this. If you don’t want this many then tell them to go back to their tents. Or that you can’t take them all.” She jabbed a finger at his chest. “But tell them something, before they decide that you’re the test.”

Michael nodded; the conversation stilled as he turned to walk in front of the waiting soldiers.

He was no stranger to speaking. After the Assembly, a crowd of soldiers was no issue. But in the Assembly he had faced down men who took him for his father’s son, who saw a boy that bore little resemblance to the man Michael knew himself to be. Their stares had meant little.

Dwelling on how others shaped themselves to him had made Michael wary, though, attentive to the glint in each eye. The man the Safid saw was likewise a stranger to Michael. It was more disturbing by far to look out at the sea of faces and know that they thought too much of him. That he had a holy path, that his words merited consideration beyond those of normal men. There was a pressure there, crushing in ways that his soul could not stand against, and he felt sweat on his skin as he stepped forward.

“I’m Michael,” he said, drawing a whisper of Stanza into his voice so that all could hear. “Although I’ve been going by a few other names lately. I’d like you to forget those names for a moment and listen to what I’m saying.” He turned to gesture to the distant hills. “The Ardans are regrouping. They’ll likely attack again. The Sword still leads them, and the Seer guides them.”

He shifted his gaze back to the men. “They’re a threat, but not the one we need to worry about. The real danger is west of here, probably skirmishing with the Great Flame as we speak. That doesn’t mean that the Sword and the Seer aren’t dangerous; it means that we need to deal with them as quickly as possible and go where we’re truly needed.”

There was a murmur of acknowledgment from some of the men; most stayed focused on him, waiting for him to make his point. Michael took a deep breath, ordering his words.

“I don’t know if I can defeat the Sword,” he admitted. “He’s already fought the Shield, and left her wounded. The presence of the Seer means we won’t be able to take them by surprise.” He paused. “It’s going to be incredibly risky, and if you decide to accompany me there’s a very good chance that you’ll die.”

Michael looked out over the sea of veiled faces, trying to meet as many eyes as he could. “But if we don’t fight, I believe that the Flame will die, and that his killer will join our enemy with more strength than we can stand against. So rather than wait to be picked off one by one, we should probably pick them off instead.” His eyes stopped on one Safid soldier who was clearly staring at him from behind his obscuring black cloth.

The boy looked very young, to be wearing such a uniform.

“I’m not asking any of you to come,” Michael said. “I advise against it, in fact. Strongly. Your lives are forfeit if you join me, and I can’t guarantee that you’ll die in service of anything but my foolishness. But we could use a few more men, so if any of you are willing-”

He paused as a scattering of soldiers stepped forward immediately. Not all of them, not even most. More than Michael had expected, though, given that he was actively trying to dampen their fervor. In their wake, another handful of men stepped forward, then their fellows beside them. Several officers came along with them, spurring their men to do the same; the young man in front took a firm step without shifting his gaze.

Some voices broke the quiet, muttering to their neighbors or laughing at their own audacity; one man in the back looked around with a grin and cupped his hand to his mouth.

“My soul to the One!” he shouted.

Michael’s gut turned to ice; he fixed the man with a stare; some others in the crowd cheered and repeated it. More men stepped forward.

He turned to glare at Lars, who smiled back. “What were you telling them?” he hissed. “I specifically didn’t want-”

“Nothing!” Lars insisted. The other man held his hands up, though his smile grew. “I imagine some of this lot must have heard me and the boys shouting that back in Daressa, when we were trying to get a rise out of them.”

Michael looked back to the crowd, unconvinced, feeling sick to his stomach as more of them stepped forward. Not to follow Michael, or in service of his plan, but to follow a man who Michael wasn’t sure stood here at all. Their pledges rang out all the same. Most of the crowd had stepped forward by this point.

“Stand me in front of a verifex, I didn’t say anything to them,” Lars insisted. Yet he still smiled. Michael couldn’t bear to look at it.

Sobriquet’s voice drifted close to his ear, low and amused against the surge of emotion from the front; her veil dimmed their cheers. “What’s the matter?” she murmured. “Don’t you trust Lars?”

His misgivings aside, the evening saw them marching south in force. There had been enough volunteers that the Safid officers were turning latecomers away; they did not want to leave the line entirely defenseless. As it was, about half of the remaining ensouled and a good number of unsouled men volunteered to join their expedition.

Michael looked out over the vast column as it set out. The officers had the men in immaculate ranks, and each one marched with vigor despite the trials of the day before. Even Zabala looked grudgingly impressed.

But the only emotion Michael could muster was a sick dread that knotted his stomach, twisting the pride and excitement he felt all around him into sinister mockeries of themselves.

Zabala walked closer, nudging him in the side. “Don’t look so glum,” he said. “This is a better turnout than we had any right to expect.”

“It’s too many.” Michael plodded along quietly, shaking his head. “A mere few strong ensouled with your backing would have been better. There’s no way we can protect this many men. They’re following me to their deaths.”

Zabala chuckled. “A bit arrogant of you to think that you can go up against the Ardans without losing a man,” he said. “Men will die. Probably a lot of them. What you’re aiming for is to lower the count, not eliminate it entirely.”

Michael grimaced. “I’m not so blind as to think I can do this without losing a man, but they don’t know what they’re signing up for. This won’t be some grand test of their strength, like they believe it to be. I don’t have any holy purpose for them. They’re going to line up and die randomly, meaninglessly, because they think I’m the Caller from their stories.”

“You as much as told them that you were. You can’t invoke the name when it’s convenient for you and put it aside in the next moment,” Zabala scoffed. “But you’re not claiming to be perfect; you said this mission was certain death. They came anyway.”

“I suppose I don’t understand why.” Michael looked back at the column of men, at their smiles. The mood was excited, expectant, with none of the dread that Michael felt. “I don’t know what makes a man march joyously to his death. For all that I’ve put myself in danger, I never felt happy about it.”

Zabala took his cap off, scratching at his hair. “Nobody ever credited the Safid with an abundance of sanity,” he said. “But there is something to be said for marching with purpose - a purpose you can take pride in.” He paused, sliding his cap quietly back onto his head. When he resumed talking, his voice was quiet.

“It’s been a while for me,” he said. “I love Mendian. You know I do. It’s a beacon - the beacon of civilization on this world, and I’ve always believed that. Leaders like Antolin and the Star are the reason why I enlisted. But more and more that isn’t who directs us. It’s men like Lekubarri and Mendoza, the sneering batzarkideak who want to use Mendiko blood to clear the way for their trade ships. To use our might against downtrodden innocents in Ghar.”

He shook his head. “I think Mendian has lost itself, because I don’t see it in our occupation or our cowardly neutrality. I see it here, with you, marching against men that would set the world ablaze for madness and spite. And while I can’t speak for the others - I think the rest of the men see the Ardalt that’s being strangled by men like your father. The ones who joined today, they see the Saf that Taskin never showed them. We’re not choosing death, Michael; this is the only way forward where we can see life.”

Michael looked back over the crowd. His eyes found Lars and the other Ardan soldiers, marching in a close-knit formation alongside the Safid. Their backs were straight, their eyes held up. The note of pride that resonated from them stood apart from the Safid chorus, a minor harmony that rang with extra force in Michael’s chest.

“It seems great,” he muttered. “I wish I could see it.”

“Doesn’t matter if you see it. They do.” Zabala gave him a rare grin. “One of the first things I learned about leading soldiers was that you only need to lead them when they don’t have a direction. Once they’re already marching, you can just shut up and let them work.”

Michael snorted. “So-”

“So shut up,” Zabala advised. “And let us work.”

The conversation stilled after that, not least because the distant thunder of guns intruded on the idyll of their march. It was late enough now that Michael could see the flash of their fire illuminating the hills. He began to guide the shells aside, an easier task now that they were away from the camp.

Soon the rain of shells fell steadily, though almost harmlessly. A few men were injured by unlucky bits of shrapnel; one man turned his ankle while distracted by an explosion. These few interruptions were dealt with smoothly, with Michael pausing to heal one of the nearby grazes himself. He felt that his brief exposure to the Safid anatomentes was already improving his technique, though the wound was light enough that it didn’t require much.

Their pace did slow, though, as the fire intensified and the terrain sloped steadily upward. Sibyl’s eye was on them now. Michael felt it like summer sun on the back of his neck, angry and red; he did not bother to look up at it. Any temptation to talk with her, reason with her had fled.

He kept walking, and his men followed. They reached the nearest of the abandoned Safid lines before long, remnants of scorched tents and the discarded refuse of battle littering the ground in a ragged line. Corpses still lay frozen on the ground. Mostly Ardan, but there were more than a few Safid that had fallen in the defense; the troops lost the jaunty stride of their earlier march and continued their advance with a newfound sobriety.

Their scouts began to report back resistance - not, as Michael initially assumed, the advance elements of the Ardan defense, but the discarded men from obruor-led units still roaming the space between lines. They were little threat to the column, but more than a few times they were forced to pause and deal with mobs of ragged, feral men that lurched towards them from the brush.

As they drew closer to the mountains the land teemed with them. Some vestige of their minds remembered where their camp was and drew them back, limping and staggering, but lacked the awareness to guide them properly home. Michael wondered if those that made it back were re-enlisted or merely shot as they approached.

They stopped before they were in direct sight of the Ardans to form up their lines. Men spread to the side, with the small groups of potentes they had used to screen their column’s advance spreading farther into the wild brush of the mountains. Gunshots erupted here and there in the last vestiges of twilight as they found their Ardan counterparts.

The ridge was no barrier to Michael’s sight, though. He sent it upward, forward, searching through the night until he found the line of Ardan soldiers. They had set up in the remnants of the farthest Safid line, clearing out some of the trenchworks and turning around the few guns that the defenders had neglected to destroy on their retreat. To this they had added their own artillery, as well as a still-formidable cadre of men.

But the men were not what drew Michael’s eye. Near the center of the lines stood a company of black-clad Swordsmen, their grim faces trained on the ridgeline. Their trenches were broad and deep, and most of the remaining guns operated near their position. Compared to the remainder of the Ardan forces they were an intimidating sight, dark figures in the night holding against their advance.

And still, Michael’s sight strayed past them to a void in their lines. The Swordsmen stayed clear of a small patch of ground as if an unseen wall restrained them. In the center of that patch was Friedrich.

He was still barefoot. His trousers hung torn and bloody from where Michael had wounded him earlier. The rest of him was filthy; his beard was wild and crusted with dried blood. His ragged shirt had been discarded, and Michael could see Friedrich’s ribs clearly under his bruised skin. His eyes burned clear in the night, though, fixed on the encroaching darkness.

Michael swallowed against a dry mouth. “Well, I have good news,” he murmured. “We won’t have to go looking for Sever.”

He pulled his sight back to see Sobriquet giving him an unimpressed look. “I can see that,” she said. “I don’t think his willingness to fight was ever in doubt. Did you have any thoughts on actually dealing with the crazy bastard?”

“I have notions,” Michael said. “Faint ones. He’s strong, Sera. Every time we meet it gets harder to walk away from a fight with him. The last time, I almost didn’t.”

She pressed her lips together, then nodded and leaned in close. “You realize that if you die to that idiot and dump all of your souls in Luc’s lap, I may never forgive you.”

“You’re ever in the forefront of my mind,” Michael grinned, leaning in to kiss her. “I’ll do my best not to disappoint you.” He looked back towards the Ardan lines, his smile fading. “But this has to be the last time. I’ve withheld from killing him, and he’s done the same for me - to both of our detriment, I think. Amira was right. He should have died back in Daressa, whatever the consequences. All the men that die tonight, they might have lived if we had chosen differently back then.”

“Or found another way to die.” Sobriquet scowled up at him. “I’m inclined to agree with you, but now is not the time to go borrowing blame.”

Michael raised his head, taking a breath of the night air. The men around him were ready, formed into their lines. Lars and Zabala had collected a few stray Safid soldiers to flesh out their unit; they stood beside Michael’s position. The gunfire had tapered away as they advanced, leaving the night mostly quiet, expectant - ready.

Michael began to walk forward.