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CaveLeather
His voice dropped low, thick with an elder's worry and a commander's heavy responsibility.
"Tiberius, level with me. Are you dead-set on crossing east because you want one last fat haul of loot… or do you actually have a different plan?"
"I admit it—pulling back into the Disputed Lands colonies now looks like a mistake. You're right, we could easily run into the enemy before our own allies."
"But we don't have to cross the damn river!" Jules jabbed his baton at the Rhaesh region downstream of Broken Spear City.
"Just like you said, their main force has already taken the Flank Corridor and is pushing into the interior. Rhaesh is probably empty right now."
"And our navy still owns the Disputed River!"
"Listen, kid—we sail straight south down the river! If we move fast enough, we can link up with the fleet in Rhaesh before the enemy even spots us. That's the safest route! Why risk crossing into Volantis's own backyard, straight into the tiger's mouth? I don't see why this gamble is necessary!"
Tiberius jerked his head up. There was no teenage hesitation in his eyes—only the razor-sharp glare of a hawk.
"Uncle, haven't you seen it yet?" His finger stabbed the winding blue line of the Disputed River and the colonies marked as Three Daughters territory.
"Look at this upstream stretch! Barren! Poor! Almost no reliable supply points! By the time we march south and reach Rhaesh, we'll starve to death first!"
"Uncle, ever since we headed north, when have our supplies ever been stable? We've been scraping by the whole time. The only reason everyone's eating well now is because we've been living off the enemy! If we retreat south in a hurry with no rear support and no grain coming in, what do three thousand men eat? River water?"
He stepped closer, voice urgent and forceful. "And that's while we're still on the western side of the Broken Spear Mountains, where natural defenses and the roads the Three Daughters built are helping us."
"Now we'd be marching along the Disputed River all the way to Rhaesh. No food, no supplies—before we even get there we'll lose at least a quarter of the men!"
"Worse still—" Tiberius moved a chess piece engraved with a swift warhorse and a rider holding a curved blade onto the Rhaesh region.
"Uncle." Tiberius looked up, eyes blazing.
"If you were Volantis's General Marcus, and you'd just taken the Flank Corridor with the entire Disputed Lands interior wide open in front of you—once their scouts spot our isolated army marching south—" Tiberius's face went slightly pale.
"Uncle, how many horses do we have? How many boats? Most of our men are on foot! And the Volantenes? How many light cavalry do they have?"
Tiberius painted the nightmare scenario: "If Marcus decides to retreat from upstream, even if his main force is slow, he'll send out swarms of cavalry as vanguard and scouts. Our exhausted, low-mobility infantry marching on open river plains will be like carrion to vultures. They'll wear us down and shatter us!"
"That Volantene general just suffered a defeat and needs a victory—any victory—to shut up his political enemies back home and save his own skin!"
"And our army—the one that just crushed their detachment upstream and is now marching south alone—is the perfect target! A fat piece of meat delivered right to his mouth to restore his honor!"
Tiberius took a deep breath and concluded with iron certainty: "So marching south looks safe, but it's actually nine deaths and no life—or ten deaths with no survival! It's slow suicide!"
"Even worse, marching south will make supply problems harder than when we came north! Forget everything else, Uncle—once we head south the only places we can hope to resupply are Rhaesh's granaries and villages. But right now Rhaesh is so stripped that even the rats are starving. If I were General Marcus and I saw the entire Disputed River flying Three Daughters banners, the first thing I'd do is turn the whole region into scorched earth—just to keep myself alive!"
Tiberius stabbed his finger toward the east bank.
"Crossing east is the only door to life! We have captured maps—we know their nearest strongpoints are empty! We take them, we get supplies, we get defensible bases! We can disrupt their rear, force them to split their forces, maybe even create a miracle! Uncle, this isn't greed or glory-hunting—this is fighting for survival!"
Jules stared at the map, then at Tiberius's tense, excited face. The tent was silent except for the hiss of the oil lamp and the distant murmur of the river. Finally he let out a long breath. The last trace of hesitation vanished, replaced by grim resolve. He slammed his fist on the table so hard the pieces jumped.
"Fuck it! We trust the kid this time! Cross east!"
The salty sea wind carried the stench of charred wood and faint corpse rot, whipping across a pathetic "patchwork ship."
The vessel was two battered flat-bottomed longboats lashed together into a crude catamaran, rocking gently on the waves near the mouth of the Disputed River. Beside it floated two more half-sunken flatboats.
The tiny fleet carried about eighty gaunt, ragged pirates and sailors. Most were wounded, sitting or lying down. The mood was so heavy you could wring water out of it.
Sevita—a fifteen-year-old Ironborn boy with a new knife scar across his cheek and a face already weathered by wind and salt—scowled as he lowered a cracked spyglass he'd looted.
He spat a bloody glob, voice hoarse but fierce: "Fuck me, those Volantene turtle-fuckers must've pissed off the Drowned God something fierce! Sailing out of a port and running straight into His wrath? That admiral of theirs must've gotten drunk one night and fucked the Drowned God's wife—then pumped her full! Pah! I shit on all eighteen generations of his ancestors!!!"
He got angrier the more he talked and kicked the wobbling gunwale. "And then what? That seaweed-brained, seal-clubbed admiral sees the land army lords getting rich—stealing gold, grain, women—and gets jealous as a horny dolphin! So he orders us, the bastard stepchildren, to lead the charge? Straight into the Three Daughters' pretty warships that look fresher than a noble lady's teeth? Why didn't he send his own gold-trimmed flagship to die first?!"
He looked around at his battered crew and the ship that could fall apart any second, face twisting with pure mockery and schadenfreude.
"But hey—karma's a bitch! His fancy flagship Pride of Volantis was the first one smashed by a stone-thrower. Sank straight to the fish with a big glug-glug. Serves the stupid cunt right!"
After venting, Sevita caught his breath and scanned the wreckage around them.
The Disputed River might technically fly the Three Daughters' banners now, but after the fighting it was all ruins: docks shattered, wharves collapsed, no traders in sight. The water was littered with debris and swollen corpses. There were more wild dogs on the banks than people.
"Pah!" He spat again. "If those rags weren't still flying, nobody would even know whose land this is supposed to be."
He scratched his greasy hair, ducked into the cabin, and spread out a water-stained, sun-baked map he'd stripped off some dead officer. His finger traced north, finally stopping at the upstream region.
"Downstream's dead. No loot, nothing but trouble. With this many men we'll just end up as Three Daughters war prizes." His eyes narrowed with sly cunning.
"But our boats draw almost no water—their big warships can't follow us up here. We head upstream! Try our luck upriver! The fighting's lighter there—maybe we can scavenge some scraps. Beats waiting here to die!"
He raised his head and bellowed at the deck: "Stop pretending to be dead, you lot! Raise sail! Row! We're heading upstream! Let the Three Daughters and the Volantene corpses fight over this shithole!"
The order went out. The ramshackle patchwork ship and its two equally battered sisters clumsily turned and began rowing upstream against the Disputed River, chasing the faint hope of survival in unknown waters.