The flies buzzing around our heads grate on us like the sound of poorly played trumpets as Caleb and I dig. For days all we have done is sink our shovels into the wet, gravelly soil from sunup to sundown. The result? An unfinished trench around the hilltop city of Summerset. Every time Caleb opens his mouth to speak, I can’t help but notice that the flies attempt to make it inside, though most are content to settle in the unburied bodies strewn about no-man’s-land in between the trenches we dig and the city we dig them around.
Caleb spits out a fly.
“We could always try to sneak out during night watch,” he says, wiping his mouth on the back of his muddy hand. “I noticed they cut the number of guards in half last night. Maybe we go during the switch?” His tone is hopeful, which is uncharacteristic for the normally bleak and stoic man.
The Kalykans have driven us on a hard march for the past two weeks, chasing after my fleeing countrymen. Trained Cenecan officers and troops numbering in the high hundreds, along with a smattering of local militias, have sealed themselves inside the city. Any who lagged behind were crushed by the Kalykan machine of war. On our march through Cenecan territory, the devastation and brutality was hard to bear, even with what I’ve experienced so far. Of the townships and villages between the border and Summerset, very little remains.
Our Kalykan overlords had us set up a base camp south of the city, where we were to dig a many-fathoms-long ring ditch around its circumference.
“Maybe. I don’t know. If the brass orders another assault, that might be the time,” I say, but I don’t know if I believe what I’m saying. Caleb doesn’t buy it. He goes back to digging.
The Kalykans waited for days without action until the night before last. Two additional regiments arrived, each with its own conscript and baggage train, essentially tripling the number of attackers. With this newfound might, the Kalykans decided to launch an assault on Summerset to end the chase for good.
Despite the odds, the Cenecans repelled them. What began as a twinge of pride in my countrymen’s spirited defense has turned to an ache in my back, knees, and hands from the days of hard labor that ensued. Summerset stands, my heart aches, and I dig.
At least the digging makes it easy to avoid thinking about Emily and Sarah. Any time that I do, I force myself to examine my surroundings.
Perhaps the single most prominent feature of Summerset is that it sits atop a large hill that looks like it can’t hold the city’s weight. It looks to me like an oversized king sitting atop a tiny throne. The city dates back to the Kingdom of Ghent in ancient times, when William Atlee, the false prophet, said he received the divine touch from the Shepherd and built the foundations of an empire that once straddled the entire continent. This could explain why the Kalykans have become so intent on reclaiming Summerset, obsessed as they are with Atlee and making their empire as big as his.
And around this mushrooming city sit Summerset’s curtain walls, which remind me of a starfish freshly plucked from the sea. Each point here is marked with a bastion outfitted with canons.
The Kalykan response to its failed assault on the starfish city was to divide the combined army back into three main regiments, with each taking a different position in a triangle around the town. All they told us was that our goal was to dig until we connected our trenches with those of the conscripts from other regiments.
Caleb catches me gazing at the city.
“You ever been there?” His voice is wary. He’s afraid of getting too personal, but he can’t help it. “Before, I mean. Before the war.”
“Couple of times, as a lad. My father was a cobbler, same as me, and we came here a few times to buy supplies when the stock in Montrose or Vannier was poor. There’s an incredible bakery—”
“Quit yapping and dig, you rats!” Peter hollers from the ridge of the trench. We obey him, and once again our shovels strike soil. Peter glares down at us, his boots a lot less dirty than anyone else’s
in the group.
I hate the man. He not only is a relentless coward but is constantly running afoul of Guard Lieutenant Hoods, the Kalykan officer in charge of all thirteen conscript groups in the regiment. Group Eleven lost nearly half its men under Peter’s command during the last assault. As punishment, we’ve been double shifted in the trenches, digging for sixteen hours with hardly any breaks and intolerably little food and water.
“Why don’t they just kill him?” My banter is a risk, so I deliver it quietly to Caleb. “I’ve seen the Kalykans execute conscripts for less than his gross incompetence. And whoever replaces him surely cannot be worse, right?” Caleb chuckles but doesn’t take the thought any further.
At one time, thoughts like these would horrify me, but I’ve stopped learning new group members’ names, knowing that everyone here is inherently on borrowed time.
That’s the thing about the gammadon. What should unite us against our slavers divides us. The conscripts themselves prey upon the weak.
“Are you thick in the head, Boots? I said dig,” he hollers. He and the rest of the group have been calling me Boots ever since I arrived without footwear.
Perhaps the greatest irony of the situation at hand is that the captors work alongside the captives. During the day, half the conscript groups dig and half the enlisted men fortify the trench with wooden beams or stack sandbags to create berms. During the night, they switch with the other half. Speed is a mistress the Kalykans court and, most of the time, she graces them with her favor.
That’s the problem with Ceneca. We were too slow to react. Even at my home in Mustang Prairie, where Kalyko was feared. We knew they would come after claiming Ashford, but that fear diminished as the years wore on. We grew comfortable and complacent. By the time they did come, we weren’t prepared. Only one man came to warn us a few days before the attack, but he was shunned by us all, was called a madman, a liar. But in the end, he was right, and for that, I hope he is far from the border now.
Yet there are times on the front line that I don’t feel like a slave. The Kalykans give us seemingly insignificant tasks around camp so that we are constantly bored by the day-to-day monotony and general cynicism of our plight. We normalize the terror. I think that’s part of their grand design. They don’t want us thinking for ourselves, so they keep us busy to ensure that there’s not enough time for bonds be forged. Truthfully, I’m just thankful I’m still alive at the end of the day.
But I think that’s the point. After what I’ve seen these past two weeks, it’s become clear to me that we are their power, their speed. Without the branded, their invasion would fall apart. Conveniently for Kalyko, by the time we conscripts realize this, we’re dead, because no conscript lives long on the front. With every victory, the wheel of death continues to churn, crushing us beneath and propelling Kalyko forward.
“You’re right,” I whisper to Caleb when Peter passes. “About going tonight. Hoods will probably release us from double shift soon. Do you really think we can do it?”
The gray-haired man looks thoughtfully toward the zenith of the sun, no doubt wishing for it to descend. He doesn’t nod or shake his head, but the look he returns tells me that he’s as nervous about that prospect as I am. Escape would take careful planning, something impossible to pull off in the next few hours.
He shakes his head with finality, saying, “The right moment will come, Nolan. We’ll know when it’s here, and we’ll get out of this forsaken place.”
About a quarter of a league behind the trenches, I can hear a hammering almost in tandem with the rhythm in which I labor away in the dirt. The Kalykans put the finishing touches on completing their war camp. At last, a thin fence encircles a few hundred horses in a makeshift paddock. They’re beautiful creatures, and I can’t help but think about Emily when I look at them.
The nags in town would ensnare my daughter’s curiosity, but she’d lack the courage to approach them. Sarah tried to show her that they mean no harm, teaching her how to greet them with a gentle hand on the neck, allowing them to smell you first. But Emily felt more comfortable peeking out from behind my legs.
The concussive sound of cannons sends the world into a frenzy. Everyone, Kalykan and conscript alike, ducks his head below what’s already been dug and hopes not to get caught in the bombardment. The shells and cannonballs fall short, sending up huge plumes of dirt and broken trees.
The Cenecans can see what we’re doing, can see themselves being trapped, and every so often, they attempt to disrupt our work. They haven’t succeeded, of course; they aren’t fully committed to the shelling. They’re instead trying to save what little ammunition they have for the next inevitable Kalykan advance.
And there will be another Kalykan advance.
After two more explosions farther off, the bombardment ceases, and we get back to work as if this were a normal interruption.
Beads of sweat drip from my nose as I dig and let my mind wander, trying to find ways to distract myself from the tedious task at hand. At first, there was a sense of excitement when we were told that we would be digging a trench. Anything seemed better than the relentless march and death they’d subjected us to over the past few weeks. We talked as we dug, about pointless things, and then somewhere along the way, the talk dissipated to brief comments and then finally silence.
I look up into the sky beyond the war camp and see a flock of birds, hundreds of them. They rise into Brother Autumn’s sky like they share the same mind. The birds are cursed by the unpredictability of the wind to move with it rather than against it, but the symbol they form is enough to frighten me: a gammadon.
“Do you see that?” I feel for Caleb’s shoulder with one arm and point with the other, not wanting to take my eyes off them.
“What? They’re just birds.” He sounds annoyed.
“You don’t see it?” He’s about to reprimand me when his tone suddenly shifts.
“Seasons damn it,” he mutters under his breath. I glance in the direction he does and see Guard Lieutenant Hoods approaching us, trailed by a rider with all-too-familiar gray livery: a reaver. What does a reaver want with conscripts?
During the assault the night before last, I witnessed why the reavers are so feared in battle. Unlike the other fighting experience, where I was nearly choked to death, the Kalykans were the aggressors in this assault, trying to pry the city of Summerset from Cenecan hands.
When it became clear that this was impossible, a retreat was ordered, and a pair of reavers hidden among cavalry were sent to ensure that nothing went wrong. They were easy to spot, for it seemed they had no fear of death; they appeared unfazed even when their horses were shot out from underneath them. I watched as they made enough corpses to fill two graveyards.
And now, all the laboring conscripts can merely watch and wait as walking death approaches. The reaver pulls his horse to a stop five paces short of the trench, and I notice a knapsack hanging unnaturally from his saddle. The bottom is discolored with a charcoal-shade liquid that drips onto the ground. The man has shed his gray duster jacket instead opted for a more fashionable choice in the form of a vest tightly fitted to his figure. A scarlet pocket square pokes out of the vest’s pocket, and my mind brings forth the image of blood.
We’re close enough to hear Guard Lieutenant Hoods speak to the man.
“They probably belong to one of these, Paragon.”
I notice he won’t look the reaver in the eye. I wish I could fault him for it, but ever since the rider approached, there has been a certain pressure I feel in my chest that also prevents me from meeting his eyes.
Instead, I fall back into the reflexive habit of examining the man’s boots.
Sarah always gave me grief, saying my staring at shoes was a bad habit that made me seem—I believe the term was antisocial. Never realized I was doing it until she started pointing it out to me. Once she did, I found myself making a conscious effort to stop it. My father was a cobbler before me. He taught me his profession and to have a certain degree of pride in it too.
Son, he’d say, a man’s shoes can tell you more about him than anything. Where he’s been. What he’s like. What his priorities are. When in doubt, look to the feet.
The reaver’s boots are well made but different than I’m used to seeing. They have some kind of metal support at the top of the toe box, but I have difficulty determining if this is a part of the shoe or simply part of the stirrup.
“Listen up,” the reaver says. His voice is deep and commands the attention of us all. A clicking sound comes from the stirrups, and he steps off the horse, moving to grab the knapsack from his saddle.
The flies that have plagued us for days find a more appealing target and start gravitating toward it. It doesn’t faze the man. As he approaches, a waft of foul garlic stench reaches my nostrils.
“I had me some fun last night. Met a couple of your friends,” he says, then casually tosses the knapsack into the trenches. It’s a poor throw; the weight of the bag causes it to twist unnaturally in the air until it plops down into the mud.
I’m unable to see its contents, but I do see the reaction those closest to the bag have as they back away and quickly distance themselves.
For the first time since we began to dig, I find I’m not plagued by the flies. Instead, they fixate on the bag, swarming it en masse, making it appear like roiling, blackened flesh. For a moment, it almost sounds to me like the flies’ buzzing is rhythmic, like a pulse.
Only when those closest to the bag have backed away do I get a clear view of it. A severed head rests in the sack, eyes rolled and skin grayed. It lolls out of the bag like some sort of demented mate-in-a-crate toy and is immediately swarmed by hundreds of flies. I look away just as one crawls over the head’s glassy eyeball.
Back to the reaver’s boots. Back to the familiar. For Seasons’ sake, anywhere but here!
Hoods speaks up. “Who are they? Which of my conscript groups did they belong to?”
No one answers.
All I can do is stare at the boots, checking out their owner in my periphery. He’s like a statue. He hasn’t moved since he tossed the sack, but I see something that confuses me. The toe of the boot has two brass supports that fasten into the brass stirrups. They should give him better riding control, but walking must be cumbersome.
Hoods grows impatient.
“If no one answers, you’re all going to suffer,” he sputters. “Last chance. Whose are they?”
“Mine, sir,” says a meager voice belonging to a vested, skeletal capa on the eastern side of the trench. “Group Four. I didn’t realize until we went to sleep last night. They slipped out when we …”
The metal supports of the reaver’s boot clicks as he points to where the voice came from with his left toe. His weight shifts fully back onto his right foot. His left arm extends from his hip to shoulder height, and there is something in his hand. I realize it is a gun only when the revolver belches fire and smoke. The clap hits us after, and we flinch and duck in turn. The reverberation of the shot is still echoing through the trenches when the man holsters his weapon.
The capa of Group Four falls with a surprised sigh, the hole in his chest leaking smoke and blood. The shot wasn’t immediately fatal, so all of us are forced to stand in the trenches and wait as we hear a man bleed to death. As if he cannot hear the pronounced air-grasping gulps in the background, the reaver scans the trench with a fierce intensity. It’s like he peers into the hearts of each conscript and soldier, seeking an answer to an unasked question. When his stare comes to me, I cannot meet it. This is not a man with whom you make eye contact.
Lieutenant Hoods clears his throat.
“Is this business settled, Paragon?”
The reaver comes back to himself and speaks up so he can be heard over the dying man.
“I want you all to know how much I enjoyed the chase. There were three of them, and it took me about an hour to find them all. They split up, you see.”
The reaver paces along the rim of the trench. He clicks his tongue, and his mount paws forward, stomping through the mud, following behind him. Conscripts and soldiers part, giving the reaver as wide a berth as possible above the narrow trench. A few conscripts mutter prayers or protect themselves with elaborate hand gestures.
“Each one begged for his life,” he continues. “But I wasn’t in a very forgiving mood. Of course, if any of you malcontents can outwit me, then you will have earned my respect. But until that day comes, I will content myself with hunting you down like the worthless vermin you are.”
Using his reins, he maneuvers his horse through the mud, then hops on and trots away, leaving chaos in his wake for Guard Lieutenant Hoods.
“You sisterfucks are making this miserable,” says the angry lieutenant. “Group Four, you need to elect a new capa. You’ll have plenty of time to think about it, since you’re switching duties with Group Eleven. Get to work on those trenches. Double shift starts now.”
He pauses, looking through the trenches for someone, and when he finds his target, he calls out: “Peter, take your group and get some rest. Starting tomorrow, you are on night shift.”
Elation fills the men of Group Eleven as they leave their tools in the mud and climb from the trench. But looking at Caleb, I can tell his heart is filled with the same feeling as mine: dread.
Tonight. If we are to go, it has to be tonight.
After all that thought of escape, the reality of our situation hits me like a pile of stones. We have but a few hours to plan. My mind starts rushing over the steps we’ll need to take. I survey the camp as we walk back to our tent.
The Kalykans co-opted a small farmhouse set alongside the road to Summerset to serve as the focal point for their war camp. The officers have made their quarters there while the rest us sleep in the characteristic ivory tents, designed to be easily set up and taken down. As always, the conscript area of the camp is situated next to the latrines. All we need do is wait for the smell to hit our nostrils, and we know we have arrived.
We’re minutes from our tent when Caleb grabs my arm gently to indicate we should fall back from Group Eleven so we can’t be overheard.
“Tonight it is, then.”
“Are you certain?” I ask incredulously.
“They don’t give us any control over our own lives, Nolan. Not even our deaths. Every time they force us to stand as their meat shields, a cannonball or stray bullet could end it all for us.” He grows animated the more he talks. “At least this way we can die on our own terms, I just—”
A series of loud grunts to the left interrupts his flow and causes him to roll his eyes. Nearby, Group Thirteen ramps up their training march to double time.
If there is an elite conscript group in the Kalykan army, it is Group Thirteen. They’ve been given every advantage and often the best positions in battle, but they are built different from the rest.
While we’ve slept and wallowed in sadness over the intervening weeks, Group Thirteen has drilled. They never miss a day, despite all the marching. They’re always preparing like the next battle might be their last. They have done what our conscript group has failed to do: thrive. The other groups hate them, but my hatred for them is born from pettiness: the boot thief is still among their ranks.
As is commonplace, those in the group stand outside of their tent, drilling with replica rifles. Group Thirteen is the only conscript group trusted enough not to have to turn in the replicas after a battle. They even have permission to chain themselves at the start of battle, with no oversight from Hoods or his capas, trusted as they are by the Kalykan brass. No wonder everybody else hates them.
But seeing them drill is like watching theater. Half the men remain unchained and play the role of the Cenecans while the other half goes through the motions of battle.
“No. No. No.” shouts a harsh-looking man who paces in front of the line. “Warrick, you need to move in tandem with Moses, otherwise our whole line will be broken. You want to end up in a bag of heads like those others?”
News travels fast; they weren’t in the trenches just now …
Suddenly, I’m struck with a radical idea.
“Caleb, I don’t think we can escape and keep our lives. Not alone, not just us two. But if we were part of a bigger group …” I point toward the drilling group. “They have it right. How many men have we lost in Group Eleven in just the last two weeks? Fifteen? Twenty? I lost track. But how many have they lost since we got here? Two? Three?”
I’m already moving before Caleb has a chance to respond. As I stalk toward the man in charge, I see the boot thief is in the middle of blocking a thrust from one of the unchained members of the group. After he survives the exchange, our eyes meet, and he watches me with an amused expression.
I want to punch that sisterfucker in the gob.
“Oly, pay attention, damn it.”
So that’s the thief’s name. Oly. But when the man doesn’t comply with the order and instead simply returns my glare, the harsh man turns. Upon seeing me and Caleb, he growls like a dog.
I think he may be the hardest-looking man I’ve ever seen in my life. He’s an average-size man with a blotchy complexion that’s seen too much time in the sun. It’s rare that a voice so perfectly matches an expression. It’s like he was born with a permanent scowl and is always on the cusp of delivering some insult. His long, oily hair sticks together so closely to his forehead that it almost covers his gammadon. Murderer. He’s not a war slavelike I am. He’s a murderer, sentenced to death by front line.
“Get fucked. We’re busy,” he grunts, turning back around to bark orders. None of his group follows them, but instead watches to see how this is going to go down. The harsh-looking man turns back around and stomps toward us with fury in his eyes.
“What would it take for us to join you?” I ask.
This halts his approach, and he skids to a stop. Then he bursts out laughing, but it isn’t an authentic laugh; it’s forced and cruel. He’s just a bully making a show of it.
“There ain’t nothing I can do for you. Now run along and go back to your pathetic …”
A new voice enters the fray. “What’s going on, Walter?”
The handsome capa emerges from the ivory tent, and I get an up-close look at the man that made Group Thirteen into what it is today. He wears the normal capa’s vest that I’ve grown to resent (due entirely to its association with Peter). He’s statuesque, maybe a head taller than me, and has some of the most pronounced cheekbones I’ve seen. There’s a seductive quality to his voice, a comfortability when he talks. Some men are just natural-born leaders. They drip charisma, and each step reveals their pride and strength. He is one of those men.
“Just some flies sniffing around the wrong pile of shit,” the goon, Walter, says, laughing at his own joke.
“I’ll talk to them. Get these men back to training, Walter,” replies the capa. It is an order, but it is delivered with such an even tone that it sounds almost like a suggestion.
“Levi, they aren’t worth your time. You should …”
Levi cuts him off with a sharp gesture. Walter’s trap shuts with an audible clack.
“I’ll determine who and what are worth my time,” says Levi, coolly. “Now, get these men back on the march.”
Grudgingly, Walter gives up the fight and begins barking orders to start the drills up again. Levi looks at both Caleb and me, sizing us up.
“Gentlemen, how can I help you?”
“We want to join your group,” I blurt out.
The leader of Group Thirteen looks at his men and then back to me, regarding me carefully for a moment.
“What’s your name?”
“Nolan,” I say, trying to sound more confident than I feel under his study. “And this is Caleb.”
“What group are you in, and how many battles have you been in?”
Caleb, who has been quiet the entire time, decides to speak up. “Group Eleven. Two battles, but we were at the front, in the worst position during each. Our capa is a useless tool who spends each battle hiding under corpses.”
Levi’s eyes narrow with understanding. “ It’s a hell of a thing when you’re sent to fight a battle that the men in charge won’t even fight themselves. Men won’t serve a coward.” He nods behind us, toward someone approaching: Peter.
The capa of Group Eleven has caught us in our chat with Levi and now stands between our tent and Group Thirteen’s. He’s territorial of his charges but too afraid to approach the greater threat, Levi. His presence nearby makes me uneasy. Levi lets loose a great sigh.
“I’m sorry, Nolan and Caleb, but I can’t trade for you,” he says with what feels like real regret. “We have a full squad right now, and Peter would probably ask for a steep price, especially since his numbers are so low. But if I may be frank with you, I’m not sure you’d be worth a trade.” He puts his hands up in a nonthreatening way, and I see a gammadon seared onto his palm. A thief.“ The two of you have only seen two battles, but my group …” He pauses for a moment and then shouts over Walter, who is still barking instructions behind him. “Moses, how many battles have you seen?”
A man who has more in common with a bear stiffens. His arms are as thick as black oak bark and nearly as dark in color. His shredded tunic reveals an almost obscenely muscled physique. He shouts with a booming voice, “Eight battles. Four kills and no injuries, thanks to you, Levi.” He finishes the statement with glee and a laugh that seems to shake the ground. Levi grins at this.
“Big as Moses is, the blind Cenecans haven’t hit him once. Not once.” Then Levi calls out, “Warrick, how many battles have you seen?”
A skinny man, in perfect contrast to Moses, with glasses on his nose, shuffles next to the big guy and simply says, “Nine.” Levi smiles and shakes his head.
Caleb nudges my shoulder, and his eyes lead me to look behind. Peter slowly approaches.
“I admire your courage, but you two need to show me you’re worth trading for,” says Levi, who places a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Nolan, I’ll handle your capa.” He moves to intercept Peter and shouts with a jovial tone, “Peter! So, Guard Lieutenant Hoods let you off, eh?”
Levi mercifully distracts Peter as Caleb and I slink off toward our conscript tent. Caleb makes a frustrated sound.
“Are you satisfied? They don’t have room for folks like us.” He waits a moment to let this settle before he adds, “But we can still try tonight.”
Much as I usually appreciate Caleb and his wisdom, he’s wrong: we can’t get out of here alone. Not tonight, not any other night. Alone, we’ll be picked off. Together, we might have a chance. That’s what Group Thirteen gets, and the rest don’t understand. They’ve defied the Kalykans by staying alive long enough to see the hidden truth. I shake my head, coming to a decision.
“If you want to try tonight, then I’ll do what I can to help you. I’ll make a big distraction, throw ’em off your trail. Anything. But I won’t be coming with you. I’m going to find a way to get into Group Thirteen. Right now, that’s our best chance of escape.”
If I thought Caleb looked disappointed before, the look he’s now giving me redefines it.
“Their capa said he didn’t want us.”
“No,” I volley back. “He said we’d have to prove we were worth trading for.”