Troupe of Shadows by Jennings Zabrinsky

Author:Jennings Zabrinsky [Zabrinsky, Jennings]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-10-09T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

The column of soldiers stomped down the woodland trail below with little regard for stealth. They marched in single file, carrying a mixture of long spears and curved bows, armored in the dark leather and steel scales of the Dremeni Guard.

The branch beneath Sellane creaked as she craned her neck forward, trying to get a head count, and found that they became completely obscured by the forest before she reached the end of the snaking column.

“That’s… a lot more of them than we expected,” Zaevus whispered from the branch above hers. “Well over thirty.”

“I can see that,” Sellane snapped. The nerves in his voice made her nervous too, and she couldn’t allow herself to be nervous.

These were commoners trained for battle, not born to the art of the blade dance. The soldiers’ armor wasn’t quite uniform, varying wildly in its state of repair, but also in cadre markings and colors. Most of the troops wore padded tunics of a scab red under their steel, but there was the occasional splash of murky blue or dusty yellow. There were no battle standards though, no sign of which specific cadres this ragged force was composed of.

In any case, there were a lot more soldiers here than the dozen they’d been expecting, and they all carried heavy packs upon their back—they were marching too somewhere, with purpose.

“So, we fall back to the others?” Zaevus asked.

“The plan remains the same for now,” Sellane said. The danger might be much greater now, but if she could bring a force of this size to heel, it could be the kindling her new power base needed.

“Understood,” he said, drawing the word out carefully.

The apparent leader—a captain, judging by the medallion upon his helmet and the longblade at his hip—was the third in the marching order. When he was almost beneath Sellane’s branch, she raised her palm.

Zaevus’ newly acquired bow creaked as he pulled the string tight.

Sellane pulsed her palm red, the bowstring twanged, and an arrow embedded itself in the path a stride in front of the soldier at the head of the column.

“Ambush!” the soldier screamed, and dove from the path into the cover of the underbrush. What little of his skin was visible immediately shifted to a deep green. The rest of the column followed his example, throwing themselves up against trees or into ditches. Those with bows nocked arrows, those with spears pointed them in all directions, waiting for a charge from an invisible foe.

It was good that they were afraid. “Fear if the foundation of obedience,” her father always said.

The exception was the captain. He stood straight backed, staring at the arrow. The arrow that was undeniably Dremeni in make, and had ‘talk, peace,’ carved into its shaft. From the steep angle, his expression was hidden behind the brim of his helmet, but his hue remained solid, and his hand didn’t dart for the longblade at his hip.

“Greetings, friends,” he said, raising his voice without shouting. “You want to talk? Then let’s talk.

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