Soul Under the Mountain (Legend of Reason Series) (2 page)

But his son was quite large as well. There was no doubt that the two of them were father and
son, and
Rommus even looked
like Tannis did when he was twenty years younger
. Tannis still looked fairly young, but he had noticed a few gray hairs over his ears, and he was becoming a bit slower to heal. He would never admit it, but the wound from the arrow on his shoulder was really bothering him.

"How's the shoulder?" Rommus asked.

Tannis snapped out of his thoughts, surprised that Rommus could know what he was thinking. "It's fine. Why?"

"I saw you look at it several times. I thought it might be bothering you."

I have only one thing bothering me right now, and that is the armies in Taburdum and out across the plains. My shoulder will be fine. I'm afraid I don't have such optimism for Medora."

Rommus laid a hand on his father's good shoulder. "This will work."

"This is just a tiny step, Rommus. I don't think you realize just how much has to fall into place in order to regain control of the situation here. I can come up with strategies to overcome the enemy here, but our real struggle hasn't even begun. We have to rid this land of the oppressive rule of Uritus Tecadelion."

Rommus grinned. "I thought you only had one thing on your mind. Sounds like there are at
several
things bothering you."

Tannis ran a hand down his face. "It's all the same. It doesn’t matter where the enemy is. He is either outside the walls, trying to get in, or inside the walls, trying to
fire his arrows at our backs. Both enemies are equally as dangerous and I see it as the same problem."

Tannis had gathered 15 Medoran soldiers to attempt to infiltrate the city of Taburdum. Before the enemy had arrived and fortified the city, a tremendous effort had been made to dig tunnels under the city so that an eventual attack could be made. Rommus had in
sisted that he go with the
men, and they clearly wanted him to go as well. Contrary to his son's apparent views about himself, a lot of men respected and admired him.

At first Tannis had suggested that Rommus use the magical portals between the columns of temples to sneak into Taburdum, but it proved to be impossible. The Bhoors and Vindyri who had infiltrated the city had apparently torn down the temples inside Taburdum to use the marble for other fortifications. With no standing temples, there was no longer a way for Rommus and the others to use the artifacts of the gods to enter the city.

The tunnels were not as complete as Tannis would have hoped. Most of them were only wide enough for a single man to pass at a time, but they were sitting in a clearing that had been dug out in order to stage men and supplies. This small room was large enough for all the men and their weapons, but they had to constantly move out of the way as other soldiers
hauled away the soil that was being removed to
finish the tunnel
. At first the team of 15 men wanted to dig the rest of the tun
nel themselves, but Tannis forbi
d it, informing the men that they would need to be well-rested for when the breach was finally made. Other soldiers who were not burdened with ill-fitting armor carved into the earth instead, clearing the way for the elite group of Medoran killers waiting to take back their city.

Rommus leaned over and whispered to his father. "I still don't know what to do when we get in there. I know these men expect me to lead them but I don't know what to do in there."

"Your ultimate goal is to take back the city, but this can't be done by just these men. You will need to get into Taburdum undetected, so we'll wait until nightfall to finally make the breach. Try not to talk to any Vindyri, as they will most certainly discover that you are Medoran. Keep your helmets on to hide your
dark
hair, and try to speak only to the Bhoors. Most of them are probably unfamilia
r
with the people this far west
and won't know that you are imposters.

"Find the officers
'
quarters as soon as possible. They will be the places with the most guards. Almost all of the officers will be sleeping at least until sunrise. There's probably only one or two officers awake keeping an eye on the soldiers inside. It's important not to draw the attention of those officers. Make sure you act the same way the rest of the Vindyri are acting. Medorans soldiers are more refined and proper, whereas the Vindyri are a more erratic lot. However they are behaving themselves in there, make sure you do the same.

"Once you have verified the position of the officers keeping watch, you need to get inside the officers' quarters and kill them. It has to be absolutely silent too. I have no idea how many officers you will have to kill, but there's going to be at least ten of them. Kill them all, and in the same manner if you can help it. When the bodies are found, it needs to be clear that we were sending a message.

"If you can accomplish this before the sun rises, then you will need to
gather all the information you can about their defenses. Keep in mind that they are going to realize you were in there, and they will change everything they can once you are gone. They will expect you to report wh
at you saw to your commanders, so w
ith that in mind, take note of all the things that they are unable to change. For instan
ce, the location of stairs that
lead to a guard tower. Something like that is difficult to change quickly and they probably will see no need to do so, however it can end up be
ing valuable information that we can use when we send in our main forces.

"Before you leave in the morning, set fire to anything you can. If they use wood for towers, walkways, or anything that is part of some kind of structure, burn it. Don't bother hacking it with an axe because you can't do enough damage to make it beyond repair. Do this only on your way out, as it is going to alert the men in there in a hurry.

"Send one of your men back through the tunnel before you set anything on fire. He will need to report everything he can to me in the moments before you leave. We will be waiting a few hundred yards from the front gate at the
forest edge, and once you get the front gate open, we will charge in."

Rommus scratched his chin. "How many men are you going to send in when you charge?"

"About
a thousand
. But I don't want you and the rest of these guys joining us in the battle. I want you to run to safety. You're going to be exhausted from the ordeal and I want you all out of harm's way when we come in."

"Only
a thousand
men
? Are you crazy? There has to be half a million men
in there
ready to kill you."

Tannis shook his head. "Not even close. Many of the men moved back out onto the plains after they fortified the city. They must have figured out by now that we poisoned the water, so they are surviving on water that they brought in themselves. There's simply not enough water for half a million men to survive on in there—not without the aqueduct providing clean water.
We are guarding the aqueduct and the enemy has made no attempt to repair it yet.
I estimate there to be about 25,000 to 35,000 soldiers still within the city walls
—all of them probably thirsty
."

"That's still terrible odds. Each of your men has at least 25 men to kill. That's a lot to ask of a soldier.
"

"We're not going to kill them all. All we need to accomplish is terrifying them and killing several hundred. We want to drive them out of the city, and when they see that their defenses have been breached
over here
on the western side
, the few remaining officers inside will opt to retreat across the plains.
The officers stuck with night watch duty are probably not the best and br
ightest, nor are they very well-
liked. They will be the runts of the litter when it comes to military matters, and when they realize that the other officers have been killed, they will run
out the eastern side
. The rest of the army will run behind them.

"Now, on the east side of the city, opposite the front gate, I will have a full Legion of men waiting. When the cowards inside run to the
eastern
exit, they will run right into the jaws of the Medor
an army.
The
thousand
men I send in there will seal
the
gate after the enemy exits.
We will crush them
and not only retake our city, but send a message to the
rest of their
army out on the plains."

Rommus nodded. "It's risky, but I get it.
And when they flee to the east they will be looking into the
morning
sun so we will have the advantage there.
I would like to add one thing though."

"What's that?"

"I don't want to take any prisoners, and I don't want to release any of these
animals
to tell the rest of their army what happened. These people came into our land and attacked us for no reason. I want them all killed, without exception."

"
Rommus I think that's a little extreme. A lot of those men are just following orders and don't understand the complexities of warfare. Besides, we need to capture some of them to question afterwards. The information they have is just far too valuable when it comes to the full scheme of the war. I cannot allow all of the men inside to be murdered in cold blood."

"Cold blood? These men know why they are here. Yes, many are just following orders, but they know what the orders are. They know that they have been sent here to murder, and they forfeited their right to fairness the moment they stepped on Medoran soil holding a
weapon.
We know their plan. We don't need to interrogate men we capture. They all deserve to die."

Tannis sighed. "Look, son, I hear your words. I even agree that most of those men know what they are doing, and from our perspective, they probably deserve to die. But war is not judgment. It is not our duty to judge those men for what they have done. War is simply the tool we are forced to use to protect our land and our freedom. When swords are raised, we must raise swords against them. But when swords are lowered,
we cannot slaughter essentially innocent men."

"How can you say that, Tannis?"

The sound of his own name stung him. His son had never called him
Tannis before.
He had wondered for a long time what it would be like when Rommus finally called him by his name. When Tannis was a young man, and finally called his own father by his name, it was a sign of respectful growth. A young man who becomes his father's equal eventually earns the right to stand next to his father instead of behind him.

But this was different. Rommus was not respectfully stepping up next to his father. He had made a statement with a single word tha
t meant he no longer respected
his father's views the way he always
had. It was a slap in the face;
although a somewhat gentle one.

"Rommus, I know that you are angry
at those men in Taburdum
. I know that the stress of all that is happening is weighing on you. I can't even imagine what it must be like for you to have to bare the things you do. But I have been in this world much longer than you, and as a military leader I must accomplish certain goals. One of those goals is to gather all the information I can on our enemy so that it can be used against him. I cannot ask a corpse questions and expect answers. I forbid you to
slay any men who have dropped their weapons after a battle."

Rommus ran a hand through his hair and grunted in frustration. "Don't you see the flaw in that? When the enemy realizes that they won't be harmed, they will take advantage of us. They will lull us into a state lacking vigilance, and strike us all down. We must send a message to the rest of the army out there on the plains. They must know that entering this land is a death sentence."

Tannis cracked a few knuckles as he considered what to say. "Rommus, I will weigh your words. I ask you to do the same with mine. I really want you to consider what I have said to you. But for right now, we have a job to do. This whole thing has been carefully planned and it is going to go how I say it's going to go. We can discuss the next operation after we get through this one. Is that suitable to you?"

"I trust that you know what you're doing," Rommus said shortly.

A soldier carrying several burlap bags full of soil walked by. "That should be it, General Tirinius. We have dug all the way up to ground level. There's only another two or three feet to dig and the tunnel will break through to the surface under the fortification. We can punch through after the sun sets. It should take no more than a half hour."

"Very good, soldier. Where will the tunnel break the surface?"

"It's difficult to say exactly, but somewhere
west
of the museum, off in the gardens there where there's no stone
street to deal with
overhead
. Assuming they have not moved anything into that area, all should go as planned."