A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

"I understand that you have already held a funeral for Captain Lombard," General Blackwell said. "But when these talks are done, and our action is set, we will hold a more proper event in honour of him, and all the men that we have lost thus far in our campaigning."

"Very well, General," Oliver said, dipping his head.

On that morning, three days hence from Oliver's talk with General Blackwell, a conclusion seemed to have been reached.

A messenger was sent out to each of the Stormfront encampments, and an order was given.

From the supply carriages of the main army, there was unearthed an ungodly amount of equipment. All the tools that the line engineers had brought with them, for the sake of improving their fortifications. They were split off from the wagons. Pickaxes, and spades, and hammers and chisels.

But to each of the encampments, of all those available tools, it was the spades that they were delivered. As much as they could possibly manage to spare. It wasn't enough for every man to dig at once, but it was more than enough to keep the majority of the army busy for a time, enabling them to work on rotation.

"Spades?" Firyr said, holding the tool.

"There's pickaxes as well," Karesh said.

"We're going to be breaking some of this hard earth then, I suppose," Kaya said.

This heat was such that a man would sweat just from standing still. To have the orders to dig as well, there weren't many who would likely receive them with excitement.

When the second round of messengers came, loud-mouthed Sergeants came with them.

"Move it now, move it! The sun will be at its highest soon. If you want to get this work done, you'll be wanting to do it now!" They said.

"I don't think any of us wants to get this work done," Kaya muttered.

"Too pissin' right," Firyr said, far too loudly, drawing attention to the two of them.

One of the Sergeant's got far too close. "You say something, Commander?"

Ordinarily, by sheer virtue of his rank, such a thing would have been a blunder, but the stocky man was able to assert himself with all the arrogance of a nobleman far above his standing, knowing that he had the Commanding General's backing in whatever he did.

"We've to move with an urgency," the Sergeant continued. "Those are General Blackwell's orders. You wouldn't think to get in the way of that urgency, would you? Not when there's so much work to be done?"

"Thought this would be work for the non-rankers," Firyr muttered.

"Not at all. This is proper work, Commander. Meaningful work. The General said as much. Not even Colonels are to be spared from this digging. Would set a bad example to the men," the Sergeant said.

The message that Oliver had received went even further. Not only were they not to be spared, there were orders for men of standing from each force to be put to digging with every shift that they had.

It was curiosity, and an ominous sensation, that allowed Oliver to volunteer himself first. "It would be a good example to the men," he told Verdant.

"…A good example in what respect?" Verdant said with narrowed eyes. "An example that their attention need not be on their digging, but elsewhere? You have the look of an interested cat, my Lord. You're wondering what's afoot, are you not? Would it not be quicker simply to ask?"

"I don't think we'd get the answers even if we did," Oliver said, handing him the message that he'd received. "A blunt thing, isn't it? No details given."

"The negotiations have concluded. You are to begin digging," Verdant read aloud. "That is blunt… The intent of it seems sharper, though. Those seem to be executioner's words. And the spades – that's an executioner's intent, isn't it?"

"It could be…" Oliver agreed, but he wasn't sure yet. All signs seemed to point in that direction, and the less informed men were no doubt certain of such a conclusion, but after having met with Lord Blackwell himself, he couldn't land on the same sort of certainty.

"You were quite sure that Lord Blackwell would make for peace," Verdant said with a frown. "You don't often misread men so thoroughly."

"Lord Blackwell is a hard man to get a read on," Oliver admitted. "He's wild and wise. I didn't think that those two words could ever go together. It makes me wonder what he was like when he was young."

"The stories would have you believe that he was even more unruly than Lord Blackthorn…" Verdant said thoughtfully. "To see him these days, though, as you say, it does not seem likely."

"Well, it seems that you and I aren't likely to find answer with thought alone," Oliver said. "I certainly hope the blades of these spades are sharper than my mind feels these days. That's hard earth to dig."

"The purpose behind that digging seems in need of a sharper blade than the earth, I would think," Verdant said. He looked in the direction of the Verna encampments, where every soldier had been bound with a length of a rope, and only the civilians were allowed a degree of freedom. Their own staked perimeter camps had been turned into their prisons, surrounded eternally by a guard of Stormfront men.

"This is not the sort of victory that I would wish for, if this is Blackwell's intent…"

"I cannot believe that to be such," Oliver assured him. "He wouldn't have waited this long if it was."

Somehow, with a spade in hand, those words felt all the hollower. What would he be doing with it, if not that which they feared? What would the whole army be mobilized for, if not for that? What other task could demand such a use of manpower, from an army that had only just begun to recover from its battle fatigue?

Oliver left the encampment with fifty of his men. They were to put in a shift for an hour, and then they would switch out with another one of their Commanders, and another portion of their men.