The Forgotten (The Lost Words: Volume 3) (24 page)

She had left her family’s decent business to follow in her grandfather’s steps, a bold, almost rash decision for a young
and well-off girl. Good birth and money had seen her skip through the low ranks rather quickly, but then she had been bogged down in some real competition against men. And they had not been pleased with a woman meddling in their affairs, which had made the struggle all the more challenging. She had risen to command by being strong, smart, cruel sometimes, and most of all, insensitive to the constant jeers and humiliation attempts by her peers. Until the point when they realized she was twice as good as they and finally accepted her as their equal.

Then, at the peak of her career, she had been tossed into obscurity by a madman and his child.

She was panting hard, her breath coming ragged and short. It was time to stop. She stepped away, Alexa did the same, and the crowd applauded, a genuine expression of wonder and appreciation. She stood there, swaying, sweat dripping off the tip of her nose, blood pounding in her ears, her neck, her stomach. For a moment there, she considered heaving.

“Damn impressive,” someone said.

“How old are you, ma’am?” a lad asked her, grinning.

“You…never…ask…a…woman…that,” she told him in between mouthfuls of air.

“Was you in the Third?”

Mali turned. A middle-age man with a full beard was standing, watching her. He looked old enough to have been a young conscript just before the Great Desertion. Perhaps he would remember her.

“Sort of,” she mumbled. “You know anyone from the Third?”

He shook his head. “I heard there was a women battalion once, that’s all.”

The soldier handed her a skin of lukewarm water, but it tasted delicious. Groaning, Alexa and she sat on some empty
crates, resting for a moment, happy and spent. Her whole body hurt, and there was a nick on her forearm, previously unnoticed, glistening with half-congealed blood, traces of it smeared left and right, probably by her arm motion.

The onlookers waited for a while longer, then slowly started to disperse. Some remained, because they had nothing better to do. Mali ignored them.

She knew she was long past her prime. She was not as strong and limber as she used to be. Luckily, she had retained her looks, apart from some gray hair and an extra net of wrinkles on her face. On a good day, she could lie about her age and shave off maybe a whole decade. Alexa was even luckier, she knew.

She had given birth to a son when most women expected a grandchild. Risky that. But still, she had survived, and the boy had grown to be healthy and all. She really could not complain. There was only this matter of convincing everyone she was the former commander of the Southern Army that nagged at her.

Mali noticed a familiar face in the crowd. Captain Royce. He was holding his gloves in one hand and beating them gently against the palm of the other. Abruptly, he raised his head toward the bored soldiers.

“Back to your duties,” he barked. “Unless you want crap-pit digging.”

That did the magic, and the perimeter cleared almost instantly. A single soldier remained at his side, an aged man with a bald head.

“You were not joking,” he said when they were left alone, a deep frown on his freckled face.

“I did not,” she said, still somewhat short of breath, wondering what he had on his mind.

He ran his tongue against his gums in a circle. “I see that. Seems this man knows you.” He pointed at the other soldier. “Lieutenant Barclay.”

Mali racked her brains, trying to figure out who this strange man might be. But she remembered her staff well, and he surely had never been on it.

“I am not sure we’ve met, sir,” she offered.

Barclay cleared his throat. “I was a signals officer in Colonel Meinrad’s Second Regiment.”

Meinrad, she remembered that name. That was maybe a year before Adam. The officer had died of lung fever, she recalled.

“You stayed a lieutenant all these years?” she asked.

He shrugged. “I stayed a lieutenant. But I remember you.”

Royce touched the man’s shoulder. “Are you certain?”

“Yes, sir.”

The red-haired officer stepped closer to Mali. He looked at Alexa. Mali nodded. The other woman shuffled out of hearing range, limping with after-practice stiffness. Once there, she assumed her stance as a bodyguard. The old man Barclay joined her, but they did not speak. Royce sat down on the vacated crate.

“Apparently, you were telling the truth,” he began. “I did my inquiries. One Commander Mali was killed in battle twenty years ago. So if it’s you, you have a way of coming back from the dead. Or that means you deserted. You know the penalty for desertion.”

Mali had more or less expected this. “It is customary to pardon all criminals for their past sins in time of war, and let them prove their worth in battle. Once the war is over, their record is erased.”

Royce took a deep breath. “It was a brave thing you did. You could have remained hidden; no one would have known
better. To risk your own life like that for the sake of realm? Well…”

Mali knew she must not lose this initiative. “We are both patriots, Royce. We want to defend our realm from the nomads. It really makes no difference what happened two decades ago. That was a bloody mess. So many bad things, so much confusion. You need my skills. You need my experience.”

“That is true,” he agreed, and she could see conflict raging on his face.

“So what do you think happens now?”

He grimaced. “Say people believe what you claim. Say they believe Barclay. What then? You are going to take command just like that? Jostle Commander Velten from his post, after seventeen years he’s been fighting for that promotion? Now that Commander Raymond has finally died and got him that rank? He will see both you and me hanged before he lets the rumor spread.”

Mali had known the risks all along. She had known she was putting her life in grave danger. The only thing she might not have considered thoroughly enough was that her comrades would not take kindly to her resurrection, Eracia’s future be damned.

Nothing is more sacred than a man’s ego
, she thought.
What the fuck am I doing?

“We need a story.” She heard herself speak. “We need a story that will make my reappearance plausible, acceptable.”

“You must not be seen as a threat,” he added.

Mali agreed. “Yes. I could say I was injured for a very long time, forgotten.”

“What did you do these past twenty years?” he asked.

She grimaced. “I cannot say.”
My son is the emperor of Athesia. I once bedded Adam the Butcher
.

He shook his head. “People will be asking questions. And you must have answers.”

Mali took a quick swig from the waterskin. “I will have to think of something.”

“You cannot be a commander of the army,” he stated fatally. “But I have a better idea.”

She waited for him to say it, feeling trepidation flutter in her belly.

“The Third Battalion. You could have it reestablished. We don’t have many women in the army. Just a handful. Not as a fighting force, anyway. And we desperately need more people, more recruits.”

Mali had not considered that, leading women into battle. It would surely be a dire task. Men were so easy to manipulate. That would work. No one would question her background, because the women of the Third came with a dark past and a darker agenda. No one would meddle. And with the chaos of war, it might be all too easy to forge the documents, make her into a colonel. The commanders would not see her as a threat, and they might welcome the reinforcements.

“That’s a good idea,” she whispered, her mind rolling through the possibilities.

“It’s the only way for you to avoid the noose,” he said.

“So what now?” she asked.

He bit his lip, thinking. “Give me a few days to sort it out. Stay low for now.” He rose. “I will assign Barclay to your unit, so you keep him around and make sure he doesn’t go around spreading dangerous rumors.” The captain started back toward the estate.

“Royce,” she called after him. “Thank you.”

He tried to hide the fact he was pleased with her compliment. “If an old woman can find courage to brace death for the sake of her realm, then who am I if I refuse her?”

“I’m not that old, you freckled brat!” she teased, hoping he would not take it the wrong way.

He grunted. A grim man, but with some small sense of humor. “Indeed.”

Barclay left with Royce. Alexa joined her side, face lit with curiosity. “What did he want? To fuck?”

Mali imagined that for a moment. No. No matter how long it had been for her since she had enjoyed male company, Royce just didn’t cut it, even though she might be flattered by someone his age taking interest in her. And now that she was in a camp so full of virile, gullible men…

“No. He wanted to help me.”

“Why?” Alexa was suspicious.

Mali smiled sadly. “I guess his ego. Why do men do anything?”

Alexa snorted. “There’s that.”

“But he’s a good man. He knows. And he wants to help.”

“You’re going back into the commander’s uniform?” Alexa was wiping sweat from her forehead.

“In a manner of speaking. We’re going to rebuild the Third Battalion, you and I.”

Alexa’s face paled, her ghost stirring to life. “Are you serious?”

Mali sighed. “Do you have a better idea? Without getting us killed all too soon?”

Her friend did not speak for a while. “I guess not.”

“And so it begins,” Mali declared. “I am a colonel, and you are my second-in-command, Major Alexa.”

CHAPTER 18

S
onya had not realized how much she would be scared of leaving her chamber. After being locked in it for months, the sight of the palace corridors terrified her. She was afraid of the sudden vastness of space, afraid of the dark, unfamiliar corners. And she was weak, too.

Her legs felt soft and spongy as she trod on the cold stone, trying to keep pace with Pacmad. He was watching her like a predator might ogle a wounded animal, waiting for her to give up before pouncing and tearing her to shreds.

A small victory
, she thought as she hobbled like a child learning her first steps.
Every day is a small victory
. And today, she might even have won a big one. She was out of her jail, walking through the palace, free almost. If she were a lesser woman, she would have wept with joy. But she knew she must not show weakness before the Kataji.

The palace had changed since the nomads had taken over. The floors were dirty with rubbish and discarded food, old leather tack, strips of hide and cloth, rivets, chains, broken pieces of armor. There were old stains of blood on the wall, brown now. Every hanging picture had been ruined, slashed, hacked. Marble statues had been defaced, faces and limbs hammered off.

Tribesmen of all types used the halls and passageways as living space, their hide tents lining the walls or covering exits and junctions. Pigs and sheep and dogs with short, stunted paws moved around, pissing and shitting everywhere. Somar had become a blotch of disgrace and filth.

To Sonya, it didn’t matter one bit.

She had a task, a mission. She was devoted to gaining Pacmad’s trust and appreciation, and it was the most daring, most ambitious project of her whole life. And it wasn’t about the pain, abuse, bad food, the constant threat of violence and rape, or the fear of dying in a pile of dirt, thrown away like last year’s dresses. It was about the intellectual hardship.

Honesty seemed to be working, she noticed. Each day, Pacmad beat her less. Each day, he let her talk a little more. Sometimes he listened; sometimes he ignored her. Often, he would deride her, gloat over her sorry condition, try to make her doubt herself. She endured.

When he failed to come to visit her, she would feel panic in her throat. She would wonder what he had to do that was so important. What made him choose another pastime over her?

But he came most of the time, usually in the late afternoon. She did not know why he chose to spend those hours with her, but she was glad for the opportunity to work her charm. Her enemy was a shrewd and ruthless man, and she needed a lot of time and practice to adjust her strategy to perfection. Still, he eluded her. He was far from being her puppet.

It fascinated her.

Most men needed little more convincing than some cuddling and a few quick words of praise. If they were stubborn, bedding them usually did the trick. She had not expected so much resistance, so much resilience, so much free will from a nomad.

Pacmad’s topics were as cryptic as his soul. He often asked oblique questions that seemed to lead nowhere, and she was often left wondering what he truly wanted. Sonya tried her best to be truthful and humble, tried to make him believe—no, make herself believe—that he owned her and there was nothing she could do to change that. It was risky, immersing yourself in the character you played, because sooner or later, the boundaries blurred. She feared losing herself, but she knew there was no other way to defeat this man.

His stance remained unchanged, except for some small perks he indulged her, like better food, more baths, and now this little walk. Sonya did not think he trusted her yet, but he was probably convinced she just wanted to make her own life better, for her entirely selfish reasons. If she could make him believe she was harmless, her work would be that much easier.