Chương 243: Day Two Hundred And Forty-One

Dear Diary, Y'know, the longer I live in the here and now world, the more I agree with Inigo Montoya. I hate waiting. So yesterday after my super late night, Saffron and I decided to just stay up. We wouldn't be at our best, but with another snowstorm moving in we really doubted the Calverton troops would be up to moving after dark. Hell, our own troops would have problems getting through the shit to evacuate. It's never one problem at a time. It's everything, everywhere, all at once, going to shit.

Luckily for all our sakes, the menace decided to go 'check on her friends' once she saw me home safe. Some part of me thought she probably still had 'sleep to grow' in the back of her head, but honestly? I wasn't sure it wouldn't work, and Primordial or not, she was still a little kid, and needed her sleep. Larry, Saffron, and I took over the Scrying Room. We were down one scrying bowl, but fortunately Lancaster House had spares of spares.

I didn't say anything to Larry or Bonnie, but internally it made me really relieved that whatever other things were around in the here and now, 'minimalism' wasn't one of them. Over the course of the past few days, Oscar and his minions had found enough appropriately large bowls that by placing them strategically, we could scry on all of our populated farmsteads without moving any bowls. Over the course of the day, we managed to pick up all of our Cadets and the troops that had been with them.

That left us shorter on supplies than I'd like, since we basically had what the Volunteers could carry. Fortunately we also had what the Cadets could carry, which meant everything Carruthers could carry, which turned out to be a pair of goddamned cows. Fortunately, they'd just slaughtered them, so they didn't wiggle around, and he still had some problems keeping them on his shoulders, but holy shit that man was strong.

As soon as he and Fred and their Volunteers arrived, Oscar directed them to one of the wings, where Lancaster House had a whole butchery set up. Is that what you call it? The place where you butcher animals? I know the place where you kill them is an abattoir, but that's not where you render them, right?

While the rest of our Cadets helped keep the fortifications clear of snow, not to mention making sure the Volunteers could get to and from the fortifications, Larry, Saffron and I kept watch over the farmsteads along Calverton's line of advance. The last of the evacuees got under cover in a farmstead right around sunset. Fear is a powerful motivator. I looked over at the other two.

"Go get some rest. I'll keep watch here." Saffron shook her head.

"You need rest too, Goof." I smiled as I walked over and pulled her into a hug.

"Yeah, I know. But I'm tired, while you've got luggage. Go sleep for eight hours, then both of you come back here and take the other half of the night." Larry had been chewing on his lip a little as he pondered something.

"Commander?"

"What's up, Larry?"

"Do you think we should teach the other Cadets how to Scry?" I shrugged.

"Couldn't hurt, but we kinda need them keeping the troops rotated, don't we?" He nodded slowly.

"True, but we could rotate, say, a third of them at a time in here to learn. It would mean that the three of us aren't stuck here on Scrying duty."

"Fair point. Can you arrange it?" At his nod I said, "Okay then. Tomorrow first thing. But for now, go get some sleep." He smirked at me.

"As soon as Bonnie lets me." I clutched at my chest.

"Cruel! Cruel and unkind, reminding me of that which I cannot partake!" He shrugged and laughed as he walked toward the steps.

"Just another reason for me to train up more folks who can Scry, right?" I watched through the night, cycling my three scrying pools through half a dozen farms, watching for any Calverton troops catching up to where our people had set in to rest for the night. Luckily none did. Midway through the night the other two came back, and I trudged up to our suite. When I got to the bedroom after peeling clothes off and dropping them on the floor as I trudged through the living room, Saffron was waiting for me in the bed.

"You must be tired, Goof."

"Yuh... Yeah? Why?"

"Because you didn't even think of doing this while you were scrying."

"Fair point." I said, the latter half muffled as I collapsed face first into bed.

"Poor Goof. So tired. I'll help you get to sleep." She did, and I woke up in the morning to her gently shaking me.

"Good morning, Goof. Time to rise and shine!"

"Shamble and glow, that's the best I've got." She laughed and helped me get dressed. When I got down to the Scrying Room, where the maids had set up a buffet along one wall, Larry was already showing Bonnie and Raven the shaping for scrying. I nodded to him just as Saffron stepped up in front of me.

"We may have a problem."

"What now." I stopped, held up a hand, and shook my head to clear it. Didn't work, but still.

"Sorry. What's wrong?" Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. She just smiled up at me before saying, "it looks like the storm has our refugees hiding in the farmstead buildings."

"Shit. What's left of Calverton's army is probably Hero heavy. Hey, Larry!" He paused his demonstration.

"Yes, Commander?"

"How likely is the storm to slow Calverton's army down meaningfully?" He shook his head.

"Not very."

"Shit, that's what I thought. We're gonna need to put boots on the ground to help them clear a path. They've got the Volunteers to break trail, but given that even the Volunteers with them have hunkered, I'm guessing we need to go help out." I stopped for a moment, then said, "okay. Angel and Bill along the east path, Fred and Linus on the west, Lachlan and Larry on the central east, and me on the central west." Bonnie looked a little put out.

"What about me?"

"You and Raven are going to stay here and learn Scrying from the Imperator." When Saffron tugged gently at my sleeve, I looked down and said, "sorry, Kitten, we need to keep you safe." She sighed.

"I know. It's just... frustrating and terrifying to have you going out into this weather, with enemy troops around, and not being able to go with you." I lifted her hand and put it against my breast.

"You're always with me in here, Kitten." She blushed and nodded, then pulled me in for a kiss. When we separated, she waved her hands at me.

"Okay, go on, shoo, shoo, go collect the other five." Larry and I left Bonnie and Saffron in the Scrying Room and jogged through Lancaster House collecting all the Cadets who'd finished breakfast, along with eight of our Dragonhide clad Veteran units. It took me a few Translocations, but I dropped each pair of Cadets with a pair of units, then took my own to the west-central farmstead. I hammered on the farmhouse door while the Volunteers started stamping down the snow in the courtyard.

The door jerked open, four crossbow-wielding Veterans arrayed inside to perforate any enemy who might be standing where I stood.

"Good thinking, but I'm mostly friendly."

"Mostly?" The Sergeant who'd pulled the door open chuckled.

"What's wrong, Commander?"

"We need to get everyone here moving." She looked out at the fat, fluffy flakes pouring out of the sky.

"In this?" I sighed and popped a filtration ward set to stop frozen water over the farmstead core buildings.

"I can do that much, and you Volunteers can break trail, but we've got to get moving." She sighed.

"Yes, ma'am." As she turned to get the folks in the house moving, I heard something over the constant hiss of falling snow. Acting on instinct, I shaped a globe of water around my left hand as I turned, and steam exploded around my hand as it caught some kind of fire spell. a couple dozen shadows showed through the snow, three more points of light forming among them. Two of my Volunteers were down, but they pushed themselves to their feet as I watched, brushing soot off the front of their chest armor.

"Shields up and advance! Fire by ranks!" I shouted before leaping behind the nearest pinprick of fire. I didn't stop to think or identify them, just spun low and cut them off at the knees. Literally. I stepped and slashed my way deeper into their formation, going for laming hits rather than killing ones; I didn't know which of these guys had a justified hate on for us from what the cousins had done, which of them were part of Ares' whole propaganda plan, and which of them were poor dupes who'd drunk the Kool Aid.

The battle, if you could call it that, wound up being like sixty seconds of screaming in near-zero visibility. By the end of it, the Volunteers had barely made it to the edge of my Filtration Ward, but they'd taken down as many Calverton troops as I had. What with there being thirty of them and one of me, and my attempts at being 'firm but gentle' with the enemy, I figured that was fair.

I sent the troops back to help get the refugees ready to move, then hopped around the battlefield piling all the Calverton troops near each other. I didn't really even check to see if they were breathing or not, and I left them like ten paces away from the edge of the Ward around the farmstead. I picked up the guy with the fanciest looking uniform and said, "you alive?" I hadn't needed to ask, what with his breath pluming out in the cold, but when I did his eyes opened to narrow slits and he growled.

"Finish me off already, butcher." I rolled my eyes and shook my head.

"Look, I think we've gotten off on the wrong foot..." I looked down. He was one of the ones I'd left with only one.

"Okay, poor word choice on my part, but still. Those eight fuckers who decided to have a war crime party across the Susquehanna were executed. We'd show you the bodies, but the method of execution didn't leave them really identifiable, and we've dumped their bodies in with the tanning waste."

"You expect me to believe any of this, butch..." his epithet got interrupted by a huge coughing fit. I sighed, laid him down with his men, then popped up a smaller Filtration Ward above the pile of Calverton Troops to give me some visibility. I shaped a Mass Cure over all of them, then fired a Heal at each of them. By the time I was done, I heard the Sergeant calling for me.

"Look, I don't have time to talk about it, but we're leaving right now. There ought to be some supplies left at that farmstead," I nodded at the buildings, which were barely visible through the snow, "and even if there aren't, you can still get in out of the snow."

"Why would we trust you, butcher?" I shrugged.

"No idea. Honestly? I don't really give a shit if you do or not. I consider my due diligence done here, what with curing and healing all of your sorry asses, not to mention pointing you at shelter in this shit." I waved at the snow, then stepped over to the courtyard, which was packed with Volunteers and refugees, all loaded down with whatever supplies they could carry.

"Okay, everybody. Two units in front breaking trail behind me, two units in the rear making sure those assholes don't get some bright ideas about following us, and also to help anybody who falls out to keep up. We'll swap positions every half hour." I turned, made the first of my anti-blizzard Filtration Wards, and started hiking through the snow, Volunteers hard on my heels. We spent the day like that, although there was so much snow that by lunchtime the Volunteers were barely able to shove themselves through it.

At that point I got the bright idea to Air Shield the road before Warding it, and we kept on keeping on like that until we hit the next farmstead just before nightfall. Of course, the Volunteers and farmers who'd bunkered down here were still occupying the place, but given the weather? Nobody much complained about being packed into the buildings like sardines overnight. I stepped into the courtyard, looking through the Filtration Ward at the dome of snow forming above it. Kitten? Yes, Goof?

Can you check on the others? I'm beat. Thinking of sleeping right here just in case. The others have all made it through to the next farmsteads. Do you need to stay there, or are you just tired? Mostly just tired. Okay. Wait right there. About ninety seconds later, she was there, arms around me. A moment later, we stood in our living room, and I kinda collapsed sideways. Marie caught me, and together she and Saffron and even the Menace helped get me undressed, bathed, and into bed.

"Morning comes early, love. Get some sleep." So I did.