“Never fear.” The handsome Vikos smiled. “I’ll have a care for my neck; but you have a care for yours, cousin. Don’t forget, we’re the last two men of our house.”
“Yes, there’s that, too.” Glafkos slid a sealed oilskin pouch across to Vikos. “Should I not come out of those mountains, in the body, open that. It contains documents—all properly signed, witnessed, and sealed— assigning you my legal heir, with full claim to all my lands, cities, mines, and titles. As Thoheeks, you will of course take command of whatever these mountain-men leave of our warband. Should our High King refuse to confirm your military status, simply take the men and go back home; you swore oaths only to me, not him.
“Honestly, cousin, were it not for my oaths, I’d have been on the march south long since. I’ve a feeling that this entire venture is ill-starred. The army is far too large and the High King is draining the kingdom white to keep it supplied. Nor am I alone in my feelings, cousin. Many of my peers are of such mind, and if the High King meets with any major reverses or gets bogged down some way, there’ll be more warbands marching south than north. Mark you my words.”
The third day after their conversation, the first column returned, bearing with them the body of Thoheeks Glafkos, who—nearly fifty, and climbing a steep grade under a pitiless sun in half-armor—had suddenly dropped in his tracks, dead. Having no means of preserving the already decomposing body, nor wishing to inter his cousin’s husk in foreign soil, Vikos had a pyre constructed and formally cremated the former commander.
Then he gathered the noble officers in his late cousin’s pavilion and unsealed the pouch. With no hesitation, every officer took oaths to him, both civil and military. As these men were representative of the leading citizens of the duchy, this made Vikos thokeeks, in fact, requiring only the High King’s approval of his military rank.
This, Zastros refused to do; citing Vikos’ “youth” and “inexperience.” He designated a soft-handed, foppish staff-officer the new commander of the division. It was at that moment that Thoheeks Vikos made his decision.
On the way back to the base camp, he stopped long enough to collect all of the men and animals Glafkos had left with the main army. At the base camp, where the badly mauled second column had at last returned, he called another officers’ meeting and explained his intentions, offering to release the oaths of any who wished to remain in Karaleenos. There were no takers, so Thoheeks Vikos, his officers, and his men marched south the next morning.
At last, nearly three months after it crossed into Karaleenos, the vast hosts of the Southern Kingdom reached the south bank of the Luhmbuh River. Harassment, disease, and desertion had cost them almost forty thousand warriors, but, including the camp followers, there were still nearly two hundred thousand souls in the string of encampments that soon were erected.
Milo ordered the Horseclansmen and Tomos Gonsalos’ cavalry back to the castra, though he left the Maklaud, a few picked mindspeakers, and all the cats in the mountains, where the great felines would be of far more service. The mountaineers and swampers were to maintain a steady pressure upon the vital supply lines, pick off scouts, small patrols, sentries, and stragglers, and conduct raids on Zastros’ flanks and rear areas, if conditions seemed favorable.
Ten feet south of the north bank, the bridge had been solidly blocked with a granite wall twelve feet high, and tapering in the rear from a six-foot base to a three-foot top. Just off the bridge, on either side of the road, were huge siege-engines, each capable of throwing an eighty-pound boulder the length of the bridge; and, atop the wall, were three engines casting six-foot spears with sufficient force to split the biggest horse, end to end.
The High-Lord had made good use of his time and resources. From above the western ford to the fringes of the eastern fens, along the northern bank of the river, small strong points of rammed earth and timber marked every half mile and each sheltered a handful of Horse-clansmen and maiden-archers; additionally, the track above the floodline saw regular, heavily armed patrols. Well hidden in the secret waterways of the Luhmbuh’s delta were thirty-seven biremes and nearly four thousand of Lord Alexandros’ pirates.