The Crimson Campaign

A few minutes later the trees crashed to the ground. They were felled so that they lay across each other, wedged to block the road. It wouldn’t be as simple as throwing a rope around them and dragging them away with teams of horses.

The rest of the rubble was thrown to block the way, and Tamas ordered the platoons to march double-time to catch up with the rest of the column.

“Have your scouts find me good spots to block the road,” Tamas said to Gavril.

“Consider it done.”

“Olem, see that those two platoons are given a double ration of horsemeat tonight. They earned it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Tamas shrugged into his shirt. “Put your mind to anything else we can use to slow down the Kez. They might still dog us with a company or two, but I want to keep the bulk of their numbers as far behind us as possible.”

“I heard you met with the Kez general,” Gavril said.

“I did. It was Beon je Ipille. Ipille’s youngest son.”

Gavril grunted. “I’ve heard he’s a decent sort — for Ipille’s spawn, anyway.”

“He is.”

“How did it go?” Gavril asked.

“I have one regret and one hope.”

Gavril seemed intrigued. “Your hope?”

“That I didn’t make a grave mistake refusing to surrender.”

“And your regret?”

“It’s too bad Beon wasn’t Ipille’s first son. He’d have made a terrific king. I’m going to regret killing him.”

“I came as quickly as I could,” Adamat said.

“Have a seat.”

Adamat took a chair opposite Ricard and leaned back. Ricard’s face was grave. What hair remained on his balding head stuck out everywhere in unkempt wisps, and his eyes were tired, his beard uncombed, clothes rumpled. Very unlike Ricard.

Ricard stared at the floor. “You heard the news?” he asked, gesturing to the newspaper on his desk.

The paper proclaiming the death of Field Marshal Tamas was a week old now.

“All of Adro has heard it,” Adamat said.

Ricard finally looked up. When he glimpsed Adamat’s face, he nearly fell out of his chair. “What the pit happened to you?”

Adamat would have snorted if it didn’t hurt so badly to do so. He imagined he looked far worse off than Ricard. Little sleep, his nose recently broken and reset, cuts and bruises all across his face. Adamat was a horror, and it was interfering with his work. No one liked being seen doing business with someone who’d had the piss beaten out of them.

“I’ve had a few run-ins lately,” Adamat said.

Ricard waited for an explanation. Adamat wasn’t about to give him one.

“Yes, well…” Ricard slowly tore his gaze from Adamat’s face. “The country is in an uproar. The Kez are pushing the southern front, and with Tamas gone a few royalists have come out of the woodwork. He was the glue holding this whole nation together.” Ricard ran his fingers through his hair. “Tamas’s remaining councillors… we’ve already started bickering among ourselves. I don’t know what we’re going to do.”

“Are you going ahead with the election?”

Ricard threw up his hands in exasperation. “We have no choice. We could declare martial law and delay the election, but the entire army is on the southern front trying to fight back the Kez.” Ricard rubbed his eyes. “Which brings me to why I asked you to come in: Lord Claremonte is making his move.”

Adamat sat up straighter. “And?”

Ricard spit on the floor, then seemed to immediately regret having done so. “He’s declared his intention to run for prime minister of Adro.”

“How could he?” Adamat breathed in disbelief. “He’s not even Adran!”

“Ah, but he is. Or at least that’s what the records he provided to the Ministerial Review Board says. Fell! Fell, get in here!”

The young woman Adamat had previously met slipped into the room. Her hair was done up in a braid that went over one shoulder, and she wore a frilled blouse loose about the neck. “Sir?”

“Fell, what have you got on Claremonte?”

“Nothing,” Fell said. “If his birth records are forgeries, they’re extremely good. We have people going over all the information we have on him. He’s never actually claimed to be Brudanian, and the Brudania-Gurla Trading Company doesn’t require Brudanian citizenship to become the head.”

Adamat found himself watching Fell, suddenly suspicious, and he wasn’t quite sure why. “Keep… keep talking,” Adamat said.

“Sir?” Fell asked.

“Have you found a stronger connection to Lord Vetas?” Adamat’s own knowledge about Vetas and Claremonte’s relationship came through the Proprietor’s eunuch, and through Vetas’s own admission. If he’d been misled in some way, it could derail his entire line of inquiry.

“None that we can find.”

“Why could he possibly want to be prime minister of Adro? Ricard, didn’t you tell me yourself that the prime minister will be a figurehead?”

Ricard shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “That is my vision of the prime minster, yes.”

“The truth is,” Fell said, without waiting for Ricard’s instruction, “the first prime minister will be the one to set the standard for every one to follow him. How much power the prime minister holds, and how he wields it, will depend entirely on how aggressive the first man to hold the office decides to be.”