Chapter 41: Incentives and Commitment
Ser Simon Grey
The Avvar tribesmen were determined; I could say that much for them. They had only a handful of swords that they had obtained by raiding or through trade with some of the low lying villages in the freeholds. I began drilling the strongest men in the village, trying to get a feel for their potential.
The chieftains of five tribes had convened, all of them looking at me with a mixture of disdain for the fact that I was an outsider and with a disguised sense of desperation. They knew that to go against the Templars, a force with superior weapons and training, offered little chance of victory. However, they saw few options if the Templars' mine was the source of the poison that was making their people ill: either they had to drive out the Templars or they would have to migrate South, a risky venture since it would put them in competition with both the Chasind tribes that had lived in the Wilds for ages and the newly established Dalish settlements near Ostagar. Even if they were able to all adjust and live in harmony, the land might not be able to support them and the area villages could potentially feel threatened, leading to resentment and violence. It had the potential to adversely affect both these people and Ferelden as a whole, incentive enough for me to help them.
Not that I required another incentive. I had incentive enough when I discovered what the Templars had been doing and saw the young child reaping its evil. The realization came to me that Letha had been their prisoner. In my mind I saw Letha deathly still on that pallet. All of her fear, all of her nightmares, all of her trembling was due to those monsters. Even without the Avvars, I would have found a way to exact retribution from the Templars.
Revenge is not the way of a knight. It is the result of misspent passions. My entire life I had honed myself to be above such petty ends. For me it was slightly shaming to realize that I was not completely impervious to the temptation of revenge, but I comforted myself that it was tempered with a sense of justice as well. I would not allow them to harm another as they had harmed her.
Bruna had been my eyes, ears and lips through the whole council. Though a woman, they treated her with far more respect than I, an outsider potentially in league with their enemies. They argued among themselves, nattering over land and water, numbers of goats, who would claim glory for something, who owed another blood-debt, who stole another man's pig. It reminded me of nobles at the Landsmeets and various diplomatic functions that Arl Eamon had attended over the years and I had observed them as an outsider. I had grown accustomed to the hum of great men arguing, demanding and wheedling, even in another language it sounded the same.
After an hour or more, my patience was at an end. I slammed an impatient hand upon a table and spat at them, "You sit here and argue, but your people are falling. If you make no decision then the Templars will make the decision for you. They will either take you by force or they will continue to poison your water supplies with lyrium until all of you slumber. Then they will not have to use force. I fought wolves who worked together more readily than you and they were a force to be reckoned with. Are you no better than wolves without teeth, howling your grievances to a moon that does not hear you?"
For a moment, Bruna looked at me and I wondered if she would refuse to translate my words for fear it would harm our chances of bolstering the chieftains to accept our common goal. Then she smiled at me and nodded her head to me before turning to the assembled men. Though I could not be sure that she had spoken my words aright, the tone of her voice matched the seething of my heart. The chieftains' expressions varied from outraged sputtering, to shame, to mildly amused or impressed. They scratched their beards and tugged their braids, spoke a little more quietly and civilly to one another, nodding. The eldest among them, the chieftain we had first been presented to on arriving in the village, rose and addressed us, he seemed resigned and his voice sounded tired.
"This chieftain says that you speak as a warrior should and your words carry truth. They have known peace for so long that they have forgotten the passion that a true warrior should embrace. The threat that we face is too great to be undertaken by one tribe alone. They must band together or they will fall. The dilemma is that no one tribe will follow another tribe's chieftain, for fear he will put them to harm to win himself glory. They not only need a warrior to train the men to meet the Templar's arts, they need a neutral party that can lead them without favor or ill will. As an outsider you are the only one with both the skill and the personal neutrality that will enable you to lead all reasonably." Bruna related this slowly with a furrowed brow, "It is their intention to bring force against the Templars in two weeks. They wish to know if this will be sufficient time in which to train their warriors and prepare for battle."
"Two weeks," I wanted to rail, "It takes years to train men and you wish me to groom an army in two weeks? This is even assuming that there is enough information regarding their fortress and numbers to be able to make a reasonable strategy for an attack." The impossibility stunned me, and yet I knew that it was the only way. The King would not be able to wait forever if they had captured him and brought him to the mines and he would no more be able to withstand the effects of the lyrium than Letha had.
If the King fell here and had his wits compromised, what would happen to my country? There were none to take his place, save for the widowed Queen and she had nearly torn the land apart during the Blight and was still trying to create unrest even now.
Aside from that, he was a good man, soft hearted at times and impulsive, but he was honorable. It had become clear to me in his short time on the throne that he did not want power or prestige. He would have been happier with a simpler life, but he had been called to serve a nation and did not shrink from his responsibilities. I could respect him for that.
"I swear to lead your men to battle, and if I fail in helping them achieve victory, I will fall with them. Defeat is not an option for any of us," My statement reassured the chieftains of my intentions.
When Bruna related my words all the men rose to their feet with a cry of approval that would have rattled stone walls. There was no turning back.