Chapter 51

“Well, they were quicker off the mark than I’d like,” Morgana began our morning meeting on the second day of the mission.

“Sacrificial pawns, Mage Morgana,” Marja replied.

“Indeed,” added Nell. “They were basically the dregs of their units with a sub-standard Mage to guide them. The inclusion of a woman also suggests that their manpower is reaching some limits.”

“I agree with Nell,” replied Jerhz. “Azuran women tend to be kept in seclusion so as not to be exposed to danger. It stems from the early days when our population was in danger of extinction, such were the losses caused by the banishment and the hostile land. Mergna here is an exception as she is Malakha and normal rules do not apply to the likes of us.”

“How is Demla?” asked Morgana.

“Confused, but I believe she’ll be alright,” Mergna replied.

“Good. I’m presuming the soldier we left managed to slip his bonds and make his way back?”

“Yes, Mage Morgana,” Marja replied. “Nadja kept an eye on him and made sure he found his way back to another one of their patrols.”

“They’re a lot further forward from their initial supposed operating area than I’d like, so we need to be on our guard for ambushes.”

“That’s why we are here, Mage Morgana,” Marja replied with a smile.

“John mentioned Adok dealing with some discipline issues?”

“It’s dealt with; simply over enthusiasm, along with battle madness. It won’t happen with that group again. I’ve placed Adok in a position of responsibility for this sort of thing; he’s taking it very seriously, as he should.”

“Good, but step up the patrols and if there’s a possibility of taking out a Nephilim patrol without exposing yourselves to major casualties, please do so. We need to take the gloves off and put the fear of God into them.”

“Yes, Mage Morgana. We will do so.”

“Well done with your people last night, Nell.” Morgana praised her. “You picked up the Nephilim spoor well in advance of what our Seers can do.”

“Thank you, Mage Morgana. Hiding magically is easy, hiding your scent, not so much, particularly from the likes of us.”

“Do your people have any issues, Olmer?” Morgana asked, turning to him.

“Pushing at the safety a little, but so far so good. They did request an opportunity to patrol along with the others, but I’ve turned that down as they don’t know just how different the others are yet,” he finished with a chuckle.

“We’ll arrange for a bit of acclimatisation this evening for them, with your permission Marja.”

“Of course, Mage Morgana. It should be ... interesting,” Marja replied with a twinkle in her eye.

“Very well, we’ll set off after breakfast and make all speed to the next encampment area and set up the usual perimeter. John, arrange for some Null amulets for the Loegrian’s. We don’t want them to be open to malign influences.”

“Yes, my Mage,” I replied as everyone got to their feet.

After breakfast, several of the Mages were breaking down the camp by mostly putting it into pocket universes rather than take down the tents and have to erect them after. It was amusing watching the Loegrians who seemed amazed at what was going on and I took my time to wander over to speak to them and to Dorry who was standing watching the fun.

“It’s amazing what you Mages can do,” she said with a smile as I approached.

“Well, we’re kind of working on a way to allow your people the ability, but whether it will work is anyone’s guess.”

“I know, my name’s on the list, as is Olmer’s,” she giggled. “I suspect Ketty and Niras are down too.”

“How is Ketty?”

“She’s good, slowly fading into the background as she hoped and giving Joras the space he needs to make his mark.”

“Joras OK with all this?”

“Yes, he almost jumped at the chance to give some of his people real combat experience. Scoterra is forming up towards a civil war and we’ll need a few troops if we’re invited in on the side opposed to the Over-masters.”

“Hope he’s careful; sometimes it’s hard to see just who the good guys are in a civil war.”

“Yes, events in Albany taught us that. Many of the ones left in power were just as bad as the ones they ousted. Fortunately we had Rowenna’s people to help.”

“Olmer tell you about this evening?”

“Yes, looking forward to it myself. We don’t have magical beasts.”

“Once they are comfortable they can patrol, but they’ll need some form of protection which is why I’ll be handing out a few ... charms,” I chuckled.

“Ooh, magic charms?”

“Quite the opposite, something to prevent them being affected by magic.”

“Good, was worried about that, even if Morgana said not to worry,” Dorry said, looking a bit relieved.

I quickly handed out the charms to the troops who accepted them with a little bit of scepticism, though it was fairly obvious that most if not all of them were very aware that they were with an unusual group of people. They were however disciplined enough to not ask questions, at least until they were given permission. On the plus side, they were happy enough to be intermingling with the Mages as the vast majority of them were women and friendly towards a group of men in peak physical condition.

“No other issues?” I asked Dorry.

“Just nerves at what’s happening around us. I’m no soldier and although I have a military rank, I don’t feel confident in dealing with a military situation.”

“That’s why you have the Lochias there,” I said pointing him out. “You tell him what you want and he does the rest.”

“Really?”

“Yes, Ma’am,” the man replied with a smile. “We know how to do the military stuff, you just tell us where and which direction and we’ll take care of the rest.”

“I ... I can work with that,” Dorry finally admitted with her usual sunny smile returning.

“Men would like to know if we can do a patrol tonight, Ma’am.”

“Yes, once you’ve been given an assimilation where you’ll be introduced to some of our stranger allies here.”

“That’d be the wolf people, Ma’am?” he asked with a slight smile.

“Amongst others,” Dorry replied evenly, her mind in a little bit of turmoil as to how the Lochias knew. “You’re very observant ... Lochias... ?”

“Gindo, ma’am,” he replied. “We caught a few changing on our sensors, shook the men up a little, but as they were clearly patrolling we decided to wait until we got the official word.”

“Glad you waited, Lochias Gindo,” I added. “There are another group of night scouts we need to introduce you to, but after that so long as your identi-tags are active (meaning the Null charms), you can go out there and look around. We don’t expect any major encounters for a day or so yet, but there may be aggressive patrolling as we saw last night.”

“Don’t know how you people do what you do, but Archon Joras said to follow your lead, so trust me, there won’t be any incidents.”

“See, easy,” I chuckled as Dorry and I strolled off to the vehicle she and Olmer were using.

“Very, I just point and say take that hill and they do the rest,” she giggled.

“Yep, that and remaining self-confident as an officer should. Which you did very well on when he mentioned they’d already spotted the were-wolves.”

“Yes, I realised that he was testing me when he dropped it in.”

“He was impressed. He knew you were shocked but he thought you hid it well.”

The assimilation session went well as Marja demonstrated her ‘talent’ to the Loegrian forces as well as answering a few questions as to the pack’s strength and limitations. They were also interested in the Nosferatu, the genetically designed ones on Loegria were more in the nature of manufactured storm-troops or bully boys than able scouts. Nell and the rest of the Clan Juwes had their pheromones turned well down yet were still getting a lot of attention both male and female alike before they set off to scout the parish of Kivuye which looked like a good ambush spot as the road forked and the buildings could hide a multitude of sins.

Lochias Gindo felt the power of his nano-camo suit as it set itself up for scouting. The suit itself was a wonder of technology, not only diverting light around itself but also functioned as powered armour too, meaning he could run twice as fast as a top athlete and use the strength it gave him to punch holes through a wall if necessary. The various displays also allowed him to see around as if it were daylight as well as zooming in and identifying targets. At the moment his squad was following some of the wolf people as they ranged far ahead of them. Their seemingly random movements confirming to the Lochias that these were a dangerous and unpredictable foe to their common enemies as they did not follow trails but criss-crossed the area in a complex pattern that covered just about every square pace of ground. His troop was ghosting through the brush staying within close proximity to each other until they reached a designated point on a map reference and were to dig in and monitor the area as the Nephilim, as their common foes were called, would probably try to infiltrate through the heavy scrub in that sector.

Malakha Telqua cursed the fortune that had him mixed into a sanctum of Caddiysh leading a probe against the foreign Malakha and their allies. For one thing no one in the high command believed the stories that the young Caddiysh Tokneer had told them of waking up amongst the scattered remains of his sanctum, although Telqua had seen Tokneer’s face and believed him implicitly, not that Telqua’s views counted for anything and had not stopped the priests sacrificing Tokneer to Irin. That Irin was not and could not be here being neither here nor there to the priests. It was strictly a matter of discipline in the ‘fear us more than the enemy’ category, Telqua mused. Still, he’d been sent out with a sanctum of slightly better quality to try and infiltrate the defences around the enemy and he’d studied the approaches, knowing that blind luck alone would simply not work. Being somewhat of a realist, Telqua doubted they’d be able to get anywhere near the camp of the enemy, but what he did hope was to put up enough of a fight to enable his sanctum to withdraw should, as he believed, they be discovered.

They were heading through some thick scrub and had neither seen nor heard any sign of the enemy, although Telqua had felt the various scans from their camp wash over him without any sign of detection. All that had happened was one of the sanctum spotting some form of dire-beast which had come up short and had beat a hasty retreat from the Caddiysh, much to the sanctum’s relief. There had been any number of incidents on this and other worlds where the Azurans had laid claim where the local wildlife, never mind the locals, had been hostile and in some cases quite deadly when approached in ignorance. In any case it was time for Telqua to do a passive scan just in case anything was out there and close enough to do any harm to the sanctum.