Chapter 30: Turning Points

Lord Godric Katla of the Swabian island of Selz was in a fine mood. After all, what wasn’t there to be thrilled about on a fine morning such as this one? In almost every direction he looked, he could spot ships of his great invasion force—mighty cruisers and battleships as well as fully-loaded transports containing the bulk of his army.

The sea around him was like an extension of Swabia—full of her people and machines. It had been a moderately short journey from the island lordship of Selz, but this morning, Godric finally spotted his quarry on the northern horizon—the land of Apulia.

What a land it was. Apulia could rightfully be called the breadbasket of the West. The three islands that made up the country were full of wheat fields and vineyards, such natural wealth that made the Apulians rich beyond belief. There wasn’t a lord in the entire West who didn’t keep Apulian wine in his cellar, and the grain merchants from Marmora paid a call to every major port in the hemisphere.

And what was there to guard such wealth? What force was there to ensure the great material riches of Apulia remained free from foreign malevolence?

None, thought Godric while displaying a satisfied smirk. No army and only the barest semblance of a navy. What fools.

After a couple centuries of peace, the Apulians had unwisely disbanded what remained of their once formidable army, sending the majority of their men back to the fields to toil with wine instead of rifles. No doubt they reckoned that the Swabians had been beaten totally in the last war and the Galicians would always protect them should the Swabian saber start to rattle once more.

Both notions would be proven completely wrong today. And Godric would prove them by dealing with the Apulian navy like one would deal with a pesky fly.

“There they are now,” said Godric to his subordinate, the captain of this fine cruiser he was sailing on. “What utter fools. They should save their ships instead of sacrificing them.”

“Pride makes men do strange things,” noted the captain from his side. “Permission to fire upon them?”

“Granted,” said Godric. “Show them the full range of Swabian power.”

The “them” that Godric referred to was the small Apulian navy who was at this very moment sallying out of the port of Apulia’s fourth largest city to contest their landing. They would have known their odds were hopeless. The Apulian task force that guarded the city consisted of five destroyers and a handful of frigates, all of them quite dated in design and no match for the Swabian forces arrayed against them.

Godric would soon send them to their rightful place—the bottom of the sea.

“Have each capital ship concentrate fire on a separate destroyer,” he barked to the captain. “And make sure our own destroyers get into torpedo range.”

“The orders have already been issued,” replied the captain, concealing an eye roll from the lord at being told how to do his job. “See now, our destroyers are picking up speed.”

Godric watched as the sleek and small vessels rushed ahead to do battle with the Apulians. The first capital ship to open fire was the mighty Swabian battleship, Warkiz, one of the deadliest ships afloat. Her 14-inch batteries made a deafening sound as they opened up against the Apulians. They were soon joined by salvos from the other capital ships, presenting a wall of fire that the Apulians had no hope of crossing.

The battle was over before it even began. The initial barrage of activity landed right on the heads of the sallying Apulians. One destroyer was taken out almost immediately, its fiery wreck taking only minutes to slip beneath the waves. The others were in no less trouble as they opened up their smaller caliber guns in an effort to strike back.

Yet, that ordnance was from mostly 5-inch guns and as a result, any shots that reached the capital ships bounced harmlessly off their hulls.

All the Apulians could do was take damage without being able to inflict it. If that wasn’t bad enough, it was about to get much worse.

“Torpedoes in the water,” said the captain next to Godric. “We’re about to see some fireworks shortly.”

His words and timing were apt. Right on schedule, two more Apulian destroyers were taken out when torpedoes smashed into their hulls, ripping the tiny ships apart. They were soon joined by one of their frigates, which capsized after taking a punishing shot.

With more than half of their naval force now disabled, the Apulians should have tried to make a getaway to salvage part of their force. Indeed, several of the frigates now changed course and made for the west, no doubt hoping to circle around the country to link up with another Apulian task force.

The remaining destroyers weren’t nearly as lucky. The two that were still afloat managed to get their torpedoes in the water but a tactful evasion on the Swabian part ensured that they swam by harmlessly. Another booming salvo from the capital ships spelled their utter doom. One destroyer was caught just below the waterline on the starboard side. She began to list prominently within minutes and she sank from the stern while her sailors tried to jump overboard before it was too late.

The other destroyer had worse luck. She took two punishing shots, one against the forward superstructure that no doubt took out the majority of her officer corps. The other had to have made contact with the ordnance room, as the following explosion was so great that the ship was completely ripped to bits. The force of the explosion threw a fireball into the otherwise sunny morning air, and Godric doubted that anyone could have survived such a blast.

“Main targets neutralized,” said the captain once the smoke had dissipated. “The smaller frigates are the only ones left.”

“Send a smaller force to deal with them and prevent them from reaching the rest of their countrymen,” said Godric. “I don’t want them to link up with any other ships.”

The captain nodded his acceptance. “What about the survivors? Shall we round them up?”

Godric sneered. “Leave them in the water. Any of them that make it to the shore can be shot.”

The captain once again nodded and didn’t say anything further. Such a procedure wasn’t standard to how the Swabians usually operated but it was now a time of war. Godric had no time for enemy prisoners, and he certainly wouldn’t waste his precious resources with feeding or housing them.

Let the sharks have them.

With the main Apulian naval threats destroyed, it was time to land the men. And there was no better place for them to land than the broad stretch of beach right beside the Apulia city of Monticello.

It was a city almost as ancient as Marmora. Monticello was the largest city on the smaller southernmost island that made up the country of Apulia. She was well-placed on the coast, having a large natural harbor that was a magnet for trade as well as rolling flat countryside that offered the ideal conditions for the famous Apulian vineyards.

She was also the most strategic landing spot for Swabian forces. As the smallest island of the three, she would require a smaller force to totally occupy while at the same time, choking off internal traffic between the other two islands once she’d been subjugated. It would also allow Godric a stable launchpad for his forces to go to the other more westerly island or the big main island of Apulia where Marmora was positioned.

In short, Monticello would make for the first addition to the new and enhanced Swabian Empire.

“Issue instructions to the transports,” said Godric to the captain. “I want them on the shore as soon as possible, with advance elements to cut off the city from the countryside. Once the entire army is on land, then we’ll continue into Monticello and choke off any remaining Apulian resistance.”

The captain dutifully issued the instructions and soon the transports were moving forward to unload the regiments of his army. It would take some time before all twenty thousand of them were deposited on land, and Godric wanted to get a jump on it as soon as possible.

No matter what it took, he would spend the night on dry land. On Apulian soil.

“The men are going over now, my lord,” said the captain a short while later. “I can see them now.”

Godric turned his attention to the coast to watch the shallow-keeled transport ships anchor just a hundred feet off the coast. At once, the Swabian soldiers aboard used great nets to climb down into the waters, many of them having to jump once they reached the bottom. Those that were able to stand in the shallow waters did so, but many of them were up to their necks as they tried to wade toward the shore.

This was always the most dangerous stretch of any amphibious operation. Those soldiers that panicked now could easily drown if they let their wits fail them. Thankfully for Godric, his soldiers were well-trained and had practiced this operation before they left Selz. They performed professionally, and soon entire regiments could be seen lining up on the beach.

“That looks good enough for me now, Captain,” said Godric as he smacked his gloves off the railing of the great warship. “Let me borrow a launch boat. I’d like to join my troops on the coast.”

It was only after a short while that Godric was joined in his boat by his servants and a few guards, and they pushed off from the Swabian vessel as the motor brought them closer to shore. As they moved toward the sand, Godric watched as his men finally left the beach to start the encirclement of the city. Most of them would be dedicated to this task as the plain that Monticello sat on was broad and would require a good number of men to completely choke off the city.

A small cadre of newly-enlisted regiments were given the less-than-glamorous task of setting up the camp. They were just beginning to mark out the location when Godric’s boat nudged into the sand.

He took a step out of the boat and sighed deeply, a smile forming on his face.

“The Battle for Monticello is almost over,” he muttered to himself. “The rest of Apulia is next.”

Across many miles of open ocean from Monticello, a small convoy of Galician warships was nearing the coast of the Galician homeland. The convoy was being led by a cruiser named Canaria, a vessel that had seen better days as evidenced by her rusty condition.

Jack had once again lost count of how many days he’d been at sea. The only metric for counting was to monitor the amount of times he’d been fed, and by his reckoning, he’d been at sea at least a week. They should be getting closer to Kalmar at this point, although he was in no hurry to disembark at the capital city and face the fate that awaited him.

Despite being the prisoner of Eric Rosdahl, his treatment aboard the Canaria was remarkably better than that from the Tollwitz. For one, the food was better. It was what he expected from ship food but at least it wasn’t the watery gruel he’d come to anticipate from the Swabians. Even though it was of lower quantity, Jack ate it without any complaints, knowing how much worse his situation could be.

He’d also been put into a better cell than the one he had on the Tollwitz. This one had a crusty old mattress that he could sleep on instead of the hard floor and even a small toilet to do this business. There was a lot left to be desired but like the food, the situation could have been a lot worse.

The other major change was the behavior of the crew of the Canaria once Jack was aboard. He’d noticed once they boarded the ship in Dagobern that the sailors could already feel the effects of the bond—the internal link between the Galician king and his people. At first, it earned him more than his fair share of staring from the enlisted men onboard but it also manifested itself in a different way—Jack began to have visitors to his cell.

Visitors that went beyond those that just guarded him or brought him food. Jack suspected that many of the sailors were talking about him because they began to peek into his cell to get a better look at him, no doubt recognizing him as the source of the strong feeling in their chests.

At first, Jack tried to talk to them. It was the natural thing to do when being gawked at by a small group of sailors but many of them remained too skittish to reply. Jack thought it might be that they didn’t want to run afoul of Rosdahl but even that didn’t last much longer than a day or so after they left the Swabian capital city.

Sure enough, they eventually began to respond back.

“You’re the one,” said one sailor late that second evening as he looked into Jack’s cell. “You’re the reason for this thing in my chest.” He rubbed it for good measure.

Jack nodded. “I am. It’s a long story but you’ve found the right guy.”

“What’s the short story then?” asked the sailor.

Jack stood up and approached the entrance. “That I’m your king. What you feel in your chest is the bond that links you to me.”

The sailor’s eyes went wide. He took a few steps back while holding his chest before he fled, never to return. Jack learned quickly that he couldn’t spring something like that on them with little notice. After all, it was a bit too much for the average sailor to believe that they were transporting the long lost Galician king. After that, he began to take a more subtle approach.

The visitors continued to come. The first sailor must have let it slip what Jack said because the secret got out amongst the ship’s crew. Quite a few of them came to see him, demanding to know if it was true or asking him a series of questions as if to confirm if he was really Galician. Others were more accepting, and many of them bowed outside his cell, acknowledging his title without the requirement of proof.

Of course, this spectacle could only continue for so long. The visitors promptly stopped after the fourth day. What had become a small flood dried up overnight until no one came to see him except the guards that were stationed outside. Jack figured that word must have gotten back to Rosdahl and he put an end to the visitors, no doubt with the use of several threats.

After that happened, there was only one man that would dare to see Jack.

As it turned out, he was the lieutenant in charge of the guards that watched Jack’s cell.

At first he only came down to monitor the changing of the guard. It became obvious that he felt the bond with Jack after that first day. He must have heard the rumors because he stopped treating Jack like a prisoner and started to treat him fairly. That involved upgraded rations and even a smuggled pillow for that old mattress to help him sleep better.

Soon enough, the lieutenant, who was named Benjamin Torben, would dismiss his guards and take over the watch duty himself, if only to stop into Jack’s cell and offer conversation.

Benjamin was typically Galician in appearance. He was built for strength, being wide in the chest and having large arms. He was clean-shaven like the rest of the sailors but he couldn’t hide the blond tufts of hair that stood out from under his cap. He also seemed to be able to move past the gawking stage that paralyzed so many of the common sailors who Jack encountered. Benjamin seemed to figure out he was the real deal.

“Do I even want to know why someone like you is down in this cell in the first place?” asked Ben one evening after he’d brought Jack the pillow. “I understand who you are and I can figure out what this feeling in my chest is about. But why are you imprisoned on this ship?”

“That would have to deal with your regent,” said Jack, choosing his words carefully. “It seems my family and the Rosdahls haven’t been able to see eye to eye for quite a long time.”

Ben put his hand up in a gesture for Jack to talk more quietly. “You can’t be too loud with that. If anyone overhears us, you’re liable to have me end up in this same cell with you.”

Jack chuckled. “I think you’re taking that risk already by coming to see me. If the wrong person came down here now, you might be in a bit of trouble.”

Ben shrugged. “It’s a risk I’m willing to take, especially given your status. The whole ship won’t stop talking about you. It’s made the regent quite upset about the whole ordeal.”

“I take it that’s why my visitors abruptly stopped,” said Jack.

Ben nodded. “He warned them that the next man caught down here would be thrown overboard. The common sailors are good swimmers but that would be a death sentence for anyone.”

Jack shook his head. “I can only imagine such cruelty as coming from Eric Rosdahl. That man is a plague on the country. I’m not sure how you’ve put up with him for this long.”

“We don’t have much of a choice in that matter,” said Ben. “The regent isn’t exactly the most democratic of men. Those that don’t like his rule usually leave or they get punished so severely that they wished they’d left. There’s no room for fence-sitters in Galicia.”

“You would have been better off with the last regent,” said Jack bitterly. “She wouldn’t have abused the country so badly.”

“You’re referring to Katherine? Who knows?” said Ben with a simple shrug. “She didn’t hold the regency long enough for most of us to know better.”

“What a pity,” said Jack.

“Perhaps,” said Ben. “I think a bigger pity is going to be what they have planned for you when we arrive in Kalmar.”

“I think I know that one already,” said Jack. “Public execution. Some authoritarian speech by Rosdahl. And then he’ll standby while the Swabians conquer the rest of the West. I’ve already heard the long form of that one.”

“He’s going to run into more resistance than he might think,” said Ben with a low voice. “I’m sure the whole city is already buzzing about the bond with how close we are.”

“How close are we?” asked Jack.

“We should arrive tomorrow. We’ve been following the coast toward the city for a while now,” answered Ben. “You’ll get your first view of Kalmar then.”

“I’ve always wondered what it looked like,” mused Jack. “I’ve heard it spoken about so many times that it’s hard to believe I’m almost there. Hard to believe what it represents to my bloodline.”

“It’s a majestic city, that’s for sure,” said Ben. “Kalmar has been the city of the Galician kings since before the city even existed. The oldest thing there is the old keep, perched as high on the hill as it could be. The city grew around it in time but that castle is as old as time itself. When you enter the harbor, it looks like the entire city supports the keep structurally, such is how it was built over the years. It’s an apt metaphor, I assure you. In those times, the kings had the full support of the Galician people.”

“And now?” asked Jack. “What would the people do now to see their king returned?”

Ben didn’t answer that question right away. He stared off into the distance for several minutes, almost to the point that Jack thought he wouldn’t answer it at all. It was only after some time that he looked back at Jack.

“I don’t know. I’m sure they’d be frightened. I’m sure they are going to be in for quite the shock. As for an execution, it’s simply not right. Your bloodline has long served the Galician people. It’s not right to see it perish in such a way.”

“It doesn’t have to perish this way, Ben,” said Jack. “All I would need is the help of a few good men who care about Galicia’s future. Men such as yourself.”

Ben swallowed heavily. “What you’re asking me to do is to betray my country. What you’re asking me to do could get me killed.”

“We all face death at one point or another,” replied Jack. “We are measured by how we respond to it. Will you stand with me and do what’s right for Galicia? Or will you let Eric Rosdahl win? If he wins, then I’ll die. The Galician royal line will be ended for good.”

Ben started to shake his head. “You’re asking too much of me.”

Jack didn’t reply. Instead, he looked down at his feet. The lieutenant was close to breaking but he wasn’t there just yet. Perhaps he could help him arrive at the answer if he kept working on the man.

Right now, Ben was the only chance that Jack had at escaping certain death at the hands of Eric Rosdahl.

“I cannot give you the answer you seek,” said Ben quickly as he pushed up to his feet and made for the cell door. “You need someone higher than me to help you. I’m just a naval officer.”

“So was I before this all started,” said Jack. “But you’d be surprised what a difference even the smallest players can make.”

Ben seemed lost in thought to that statement. He didn’t linger long. The door shut behind him and within five minutes, another guard arrived to take up his watch.

Jack sighed as he looked back at the old mattress.

One way or another, he had to find a way to escape this fate.

His options were running out.

The next morning, Jack listened carefully for a sign they were nearing Kalmar. Like the Tollwitz, the cell on the Canaria was close enough to the boilers that he would know when power was cut to them. That occurred a few hours after he woke up that morning, a close enough signal to him that the ship had arrived in the Galician capital city.

After time spent docking the ship, Jack heard the sounds of several footsteps as they approached his cell. Two guards appeared, being led by Ben, who still gave no indication that he was prepared to do anything other than console with Jack on his condition. Jack didn’t try to intervene in front of the guards but he noticed that Ben had a hard time meeting his eyes.

That seemed to be an answer in itself.

Ben led the group to the nearest hatch to ascend to the main deck. Jack’s footsteps were heavy as he moved throughout the ship, wondering what his first glimpse at the city would entail.

Once they’d moved through the last hatch and emerged outside, Jack gasped.

The city of Kalmar stood proudly in front of him, quite possibly the most beautiful city that he’d ever seen. Perhaps he was biased, knowing it was the ancient home of his ancestors but objectively, the city combined grandeur and beauty on a scale to which he’d never seen. Easily as large as Daban or Dagobern, Kalmar managed space in a way that minimized the sprawl of the other larger cities. It seemed to be tiered, or layered in such a way that the inner confines of the city were built on top of the outer layers. Like Ben had told him the previous day, the city revolved around the central castle, no doubt where the kings had resided at one time. That castle was without a doubt the highest point in the entire city.

From the castle, the rest of the buildings sloped downward until it reached that last layer that was right along the water. Water covered Daban on all but one side where a small strip of land connected the city to the rest of the mainland. Once connected, the rest of the mainland came out around the open waters next to the city, surrounding it to form a natural harbor.

The only thing that spoiled the view of the city was the sight of Eric Rosdahl standing in front of it.

“It’s been a long time since a member of your family has set foot in this city,” said Rosdahl with a biting smirk. “In that memory, I’d like to welcome you to Kalmar, Jack. It’s the last city you’ll ever be in.”

Jack didn’t respond. He was too busy trying to savor the sight of the city and commit it to memory. In that moment, a flood of imagined memories assaulted his mind. He pictured what the city looked like when his ancestors ruled it, back in the days when Galicia was the proud protector of the West. He could see kings that vaguely resembled him walking along the city’s streets, inspecting the warships of the proud country. Even more strangely, he could picture a teenaged Kat sulking away from her omnipotent and uncaring father within the city. It was hard to believe that this was where she’d spent so much of her life.

And now he was here.

“See that part of the harbor right over there, Jack?” asked Rosdahl as he pointed to the open waters on the northeast side of the city. “Those waters are very deep right there. Probably the deepest part of the harbor. I fully intend to dump your body right about there. Of course, I’ll have to have you weighed down so you don’t come washing back ashore, but I think that’s going to be an appropriate final resting place for a piece of shit like yourself.”

Jack feinted an aggressive move at Rosdahl. He wasn’t able to get far before the two guards moved to restrain him but for a brief moment, fear appeared on the regent’s face.

It wasn’t much but Jack was able to count it as a small victory.

Once he recovered, Rosdahl lost the arrogant smirk and replaced it with subtle rage.

“You’ll regret that,” he promised while staring daggers at Jack.

“Looking forward to it,” muttered Jack.

“Get him out of here,” Rosdahl instructed the guards. “Take him to the castle and hand him off to my personal guards.” He then turned to address Ben directly. “Make sure they understand the same directive that I gave to you.”

Ben saluted. “I will, Your Highness.”

Rosdahl’s eyes returned to Jack. “I hope you enjoy your last few days, Jack. Try not to get too comfortable in my dungeon. You won’t be there for very long.”

With those final words, Rosdahl turned heel and quickly descended the gangplank from the Canaria. Jack watched as he stepped into the backseat of his own carriage, and it was soon spirited off in the direction of the castle.

Jack turned to look at Ben, who now shared a sympathetic look with him.

“It’s all right, Ben,” said Jack finally, not wanting to pressure the conflicted man any further. “Let’s go to this dungeon before we incur any more of the regent’s wrath.”

Ben swallowed heavily before giving the nod to the two other guards. He looked even more ambivalent than he did before, and Jack didn’t doubt that there was an intense internal struggle for the man’s conscience.

The guards led Jack down the gangplank into a second waiting car. Much less opulent than than the regent’s, this car soon sped away from the docks and began to climb toward the castle.

Unlike Dagobern, Kalmar was alive. Jack watched out the window as the common Galicians went about their day, walking to the market or going about their jobs. All of them looked exactly like him with their shimmering blonde hair and bright blue eyes.

Interestingly enough, many of them seem to recognize that there was something (or someone) extraordinary being carried in that very ordinary car. Jack made eye contact with several of them, all sharing the same questioning expressions as he’d come to expect from the Galician people.

Their bewilderment of him ended when the car entered an underground area that was attached to the castle. It was there that Jack was handed over to the palace guards by Ben and his men. Ben shared one last sympathetic look before he walked away for good.

Despite the conditions, Jack didn’t blame him for what he didn’t do. Jack imagined that he would be just as conflicted as the young naval officer if placed in a similar situation. Jack nodded his head toward Ben before he was led into the castle.

He was promptly placed into his own cell while being somewhat separated from another rowdier bunch of inmates. Unlike Avila’s cell, the darkness down here wasn’t total. There was even some natural light that somehow got into this underground portion of the castle.

Jack sighed once he was left alone. The last place he’d expected to be when he finally arrived in Kalmar was a prison cell.

Yet here I am, he thought. Now how am I going to get out of this mess?

Kat growled at the persistent knocking. It wasn’t that she didn’t like visitors. Quite the opposite in fact. It was that it took her longer and longer to get up to answer the door that made receiving visitors more of a challenge.

She finally managed to stand after lugging the growing bump in her stomach with her. Once on her feet, she grabbed the edge of the couch to steady herself, already wondering what this would feel like in another few months. At six months pregnant, she was definitely showing, and what used to be simple movements were getting more challenging by the day.

For example, she’d accepted the fact that she could no longer touch her toes. What used to be an easy demonstration of her limberness was now downright impossible. Abigail assured her that her bump wasn’t that big but to Kat, it felt huge. Knowing that she still had a couple more months to go didn’t make that feeling any better either.

Kat opened the door to find two faces looking back at her. One was that of King Aedan. The other man could only be Galician judging by his features. Kat recognized him as the Galician ambassador to Picardy. Knowing that he was one of her cousin’s creatures, it didn’t help her mood.

“Katherine, do you have a moment?” asked Aedan before peeking into her room.

“I can spare one for you,” said Kat before she glared at the ambassador. “But this one, most likely not.”

“You’re going to want to hear what he has to say, I promise you that,” replied Aedan hastily. “May I bring him in too?”