Chapter Nine: Broken Legion
A few leagues away, Lawe Cathon winced as Airena dabbed at his chest wound with a moist cloth. He tried to push himself up, but the Aes Sedai firmly kept an iron grip on his shoulder.
Cathon gave up and laid back, as she began to dress his wounds. Airena had dark circles around her eyes, and her dark curls hung down in limp strands. The general knew she was completely exhausted if she had to rely on old-fashioned healing.
The details of the previous day swam in his mind. The call to retreat. Airena's lashes of fire beating back the shadowspawn, and his men swarming desperately through the southern gap. Cathon hoped those at the northern end had made it out as well, but the last scene he saw as he broke free was the Horde swarming into the hole the Band had blasted through. A glancing blow to his chest had dropped him, but Nathen had dragged him out. They had to leave anything they could not carry, the tents, the supplies, everything.
Cathon sighed, "All my fault. My entire bloody fault. I should've known it was a trap. I could feel it."
"I should've felt the shadowspawn." Airena noted, "If I was not preoccupied with my own problems. But that much Trollocs so near should have raised my alarm. The Dreadlord had done something. Something the Tower knows not."
"It was my decision, and now, ah." Cathon grimaced as she applied a stinging poultice to a deep laceration, "You should get some rest, Airena. I'll survive."
"I'm tougher than you think, Lawe." Airena bound his wounds and stood up, "there are more injured to see. Sit and let these mend. Do not waste the work I just spent on you."
"I need to see my men." Cathon struggled to his feet.
"Do what you will then. It is your life." Airena walked away, her voice like a cold dagger. He watched her glide away like an elegant storm cloud. What did he do?
Cathon swept back the damp hair from his eyes, and gazed around the camp. With all the tents lost in the valley, the men had bivouacked on the bare ground.
Fortunately, the weather had since made tents obsolete. One of the few and only advantages of the Blasted Lands. The sun had set, but the earth was still searing hot. Darkness, unrelieved except for a waning moon, set over the camp, reducing soldiers and horses to black shadows.
"I'm glad to see you're up, Marshall-General." Major-General Diadrem's voice drew Cathon's attention.
"Where are the others." Cathon glancing to see only General Notar with Diadrem.
"Generals Vader, Hill, and Arcanum have all been missing since Getty's Canyon, sir. They were all positioned at the north." Nathen Austern walked up. The two remaining generals nodded grimly.
"Bloody..." Cathon massaged his temples, "What's the situation."
"We have the majority of Black Moon and True Blade. We have half of Hill's Zephyr Hawk and some of Vader's First Legion." Austern said.
"I have taken the survivors of Zephyr and First into True Blade." Diadrem added.
"At the current count, we have a little more than a hundred thousand men left. Roughly half of what we started. Two thousand injured, but thankfully, with the healers and Airena Sedai, the majority will survive. The rest, about eighty thousand men, including the three Generals, are presumed to be casualties."
"No, they survived." Cathon grabbed a rumpled white shirt from the ground and drew it over his body. He glanced up to dubious looks.
"They survived. They must have broken through the north side. They are good men, skilled in survival." Cathon picked up his battered cloak and hung it around his shoulders, "We march for Shayol Ghul again."
"Cathon, is this wise?" Notar asked doubtfully.
"We've suffered a grievous wound today, I do not deny this. But we will heal, and we will strike back. The Shadow thinks it has won. We will teach them differently. And if the other half of the Band still survives, which I believe with all my heart, they will continue the attack. That is the best hope for reunion."
"Sir..." Diadrem began.
"It is your right to advise." Cathon cut him off, "You have advised me. But I have made my decision. We will continue our attack on the Black Bastion once more."
"I understand, general." Diadrem replied, "And the Creator willing, you are right."
"Nathen, what is it you need?" Cathon asked his adjutant.
"Scouts report a fist of Trollocs approaching from the north. Nothing serious, perhaps a hundred. A splinter group from yesterday most likely, eager for loot and blood."
"Notar, lead a banner of your best cavalry. Wipe those raiders out. All of them. Bring their heads back on pikes; we need a morale boost." Cathon glanced up at the black sky and the blacker spire of Shayol Ghul, "We ride tomorrow morning. Send what remains of our scouts out to find a path."
"Sir." The two generals saluted and walked into the night.
"What is the account on supplies, Nathen?" Cathon asked, glancing up at the cloudless sky.
"We managed to pull out a third of our supply wagons. The rations will be thin, and we only have enough fuel for firepits at the siege. No campfires, but in this weather, we'd only need it for perimeter lighting. We might survive with what we have. We might not. Sir, are you sure this plan of yours is still prudent?"
"We can only hope so, Nathen. We can only hope so." Cathon laughed dryly, "Go give me the final breakdown so we can plan."
The adjutant saluted and followed quickly in the steps of the two departing Generals. As Cathon watched them fade into the night, he felt his crafted facade finally cracking. The repressed trembles in his hands came unbidden like rigors before he could still his nerves once more. He wiped the sweat from his palms on his trousers and forced measured breaths until the vice around his chest began to calm.
As he put on his facade of confidence once more, he was grateful that no one was there to witness his brief moment of vulnerability. But as he glanced up at the star filled sky, he felt a familiar presence stepping next to him.
Airena Sedai raised her face to the skies, as if pretending her presence was a mere coincidence for stargazing. Her features so severe in the daytime seemed now so soft under the starlight, the pale skin of her cheeks almost with a subtle cool glow,
They stood in silence for a heavy moment before Airena spoke. "The Wild Skies that can be only seen in the Blasted Lands. Unpredictable and untethered to any astronomer or star map. A beautiful chaos. To navigate by the Wild Skies is to invite trouble."
Cathon nodded. He expected another lecture on his self care like before, but instead her tone was uncharacteristically soft and conversational. He wondered how long she had been watching him or how much she saw.
"I am merely searching, Lady Airena. For a sign."
She turned to him, studying him with her penetrating green eyes. "I did not picture you to be a superstitious man, General."
"One does not need to be superstitious to look for hope in a time of crisis. One cannot find answers if one does not look for them."
"It is my experience that those who follow signs use them to confirm what they already intend to do. And sometimes the signs are not what they hope. When Prince Caar fell in love with his sign, he paid with his death."
Cathon turned to face the Aes Sedai and met her thoughtful gaze. Out of the corner of his eyes, he could see the rippling movement of Warder's invisible cloak ten feet away standing guard. But for all purposes, the two were alone in the cloak of night's darkness.
"Caar One-Hand may have died chasing his signs, but he still found love, a precious treasure that many have searched their entire life without finding. Maybe he was not as foolish after all." Cathon replied. "I know Aes Sedai can make their own miracles, so you may not understand. But for us ordinary men scratching out our fleeting lives, sometimes we need to believe that there is a higher force of purpose or good. Whether it's the Creator Himself or Caldazar or Lady Luck, I would take anything and anyone at this desperate time."
"Well you have me. But I am a little light on miracles." She gave him a rare smile, gentle and human. Her eyes softened as she finally broke off her stare. And for a brief second, she seemed not like the mysterious Aes Sedai figure of legends, but a fellow traveler on a long lonely road. "I hope you find what you are looking for, general."
"Do get some rest." She touched him on the shoulder with a light hand, an intimate gesture of her compassion, and left him once more to his eternal search.
In the distance, Notar's cavalry raid galloped away, a single torch among them, from the pitch black camp into the pitch black night.
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