Chapter 50: A Superior Commander

Ser Simon Grey

I was a knight, not a soldier…

…yet I was not the same knight that had began that journey into the Cauldron a month prior to where I found myself at that moment. That knight had spent his time in stone halls, standing stoically to the side as nobles arranged and schemed over affairs of state. It no longer mattered to me how those men and women quibbled over boundaries on parchment and held petty grudges over supposed slights. Their shallowness did not interest me in the aftermath of the Blight, for it was more dressings covering over old problems that twirled in dizzy, courtly circles. I followed the orders of my Arl and did not concern myself with the possible intrigues fuelling his requests.

I became a guard to a young king who I had felt was unfit to rule, let alone lead men into battle. Like me, he was uncomfortable with life at court for he had not been groomed for the responsibilities he was thrust into. My presence had been intended by the Arl to be a steadying influence on the boy, or so I was told. Looking back at that point, it became obvious that I was also a means to manipulate the king, to keep him in the parameters that the Arl desired and not cut loose and the king had allowed it, modifying his expressions and actions to suit my foreboding brow. In a manner, I was no more than a scarecrow of displeasure.

In light of all that had occurred I had to acknowledge that I had done an injustice by the young king, as he had proven himself to be an able man with a good heart, though he had little confidence in himself. I could claim some fault for that, I realized. He was a man worthy of respect that I had been reluctant to bestow. He readily took responsibility and, without thinking at times, he behaved kingly, disregarding the time wrought prejudices of a worn out old knight.

Alone in the dark clearing I gathered my thoughts and my failings about me. For that time I saw the mirror of my situation with that of the king I had once so heartily resented: I was called by necessity into a role I was unprepared for but I needed to complete. The lives of an entire people leaned on my shoulders, including Bruna and Letha.

I had been solitary for so long. Once I had carried a mother and a sister, but now my mother was dead and my sister had a husband and children to care for her. My duty to the Arl had been all after that, but once the rebellion was over and the Orlesians were driven from Ferelden, my service seemed to be figurative. Even I could not help the Arl when he became sick and the knights searched vainly for a holy cure, a cure discovered and returned by the man who would eventually be the king I brow beat over small niceties. I had become as petty as the nobles I despised.

This past month I had been called to lead and was betrayed by a brother-at-arms, rescued by green men and my king and lost my armor. I was guided and teased by a masquerading noble woman, cajoled into shepherding doomed villagers from the hands of unjust Templars, lost one of my charge in my sleep, led on a mad chase through the Cauldron countryside, chided by a cunning cook and inadvertently threatened a lyrium addled Chantry sister. After this I was mauled by a bear, effectively winging my sword arm, lost the aforementioned Chantry sister to the woods along with the king I was sworn to serve, attacked by mercenaries and propositioned by a maleficar.

What did the maleficar request? She wanted me to train an army of Avvar warriors in the art of battle against a superior force…and I had agreed. Had she overcome my mind?

"Hardly," came a voice that had become both familiar and unwelcome. She had been spying on me from the trees, or perhaps she crept upon me in the guise of an animal, I cared not. All I cared about was that she had been listening as I groused beneath my breath. Her ears were certainly sound.

"What do you want?" I demanded, refusing to spare her a glance.

"I was merely passing, taking care of my own needs," she purred, "but I could not help but notice your pacing. An Avvar would not have been taken so unaware."

The withering look I bestowed upon her would have frozen ale, "I am no Avvar. Perhaps it would be better for them if another took up their lead and I was abandoned here in the woods to meet my end. I belong in a forgotten corner of a forest. I am a ruin after all."

"Such self-pitying," her tongue clicked, though she smirked, "and it has yet to help you."

"Be gone, witch," I spat.

"You waste your ire on me, good knight. You waste your ire on the men who you are striving to teach as well, barking like a toothless mabari, and it is getting you nowhere." She observed. Her lithe form leaned against a tree and her arms crossed her breast. The frown on her face communicated displeasure, though her voice was neutral of it.

Her words brought to mind the young men I attempted to drill, day after day. These men watched me with a devoted determination that rivaled Ser Hadrian. Every time I knocked them down, they got back up. Every time I berated them, they pushed harder and yet made no improvement as blood and sweat intermingled with the force of their exertions. I had to turn them into an army and I was failing, not because they lacked conviction or strength. No, we were not failing because of them. The fault surely lay with me.

Thoughts of Forthwind only added to my sense of futility, for I knew not where he was or if he was even alive. The very thought of him plagued me, accusing me of inadequacy. I had led him into a trap as surely as the king, stranding him in this wilderness, pitting him against the mercy of the beasts that beset us. I had failed him as surely as I was failing these men. He had been a strong knight, an eager pupil and I had begun to fear that I had been a poor teacher. Now my singular failings with Forthwind multiplied before my eyes in the personage of a force of men I was training for battle. These were young men and they had everything to lose if we failed, yet they followed me without question. They struggled to learn, despite a language barrier and lacking supplies. The reality became clearer each passing day: "I cannot teach these men to take down a Templar as knights or soldiers. I am inadequate to the task."

The words were hurled at the witch who had found me and goaded me into this mess. If I was at fault, then she was equally to blame.

"Ah, so there we have it," she smiled, seeming to regain her teasing humor, "you are finally seeing reason. Whoever had said that you had to teach these men to be knights or soldiers? You lead the finest warriors these mountains have ever seen on her surface. Battle is in their blood. Their entire lives are a struggle against the elements, against each other. You have the opportunity to focus that energy into a force. They need not be knights or soldiers when they are Avvar."

"If I am not to turn them into soldiers, then what use am I?" I growled, feeling the old petulance peaking that I had become accustomed to with Svenya. Aspects of this woman reminded me of her, and yet I trusted Svenya and I could never trust this viper.

"You can be useless then, if that pleases you," she retorted, seeming equally petulant, "but you are a wiser man than that, I think."

I shook my head, "We are to take on a superior force with superior weapons and superior training."

"We have superior warriors with superior training: they just need to focus what they already possess to accurately meet the force. Superior weapons can have flaws, superior armor can have chinks, superior defenses can have holes and superior commanders can be manipulated by their own arrogance to make mistakes. The Avvars needed a man who understood this, who has been humbled by experience so that he does not make the same mistakes. Will you be this man, I wonder?" She finished, her eyes twinkling though her face maintained a mien of boredom.

I gaped, blinking for a moment as realization swelled in my breast. I had been a fool, but I would be a fool no longer, "Gather the men, then. In particular, I will need a handful who can speak my language well enough to understand my instructions beyond crude gestures and signs. If I have five, that will suffice. If there are more, the Maker may smile on us yet. They must teach me their tactics, their strengths. I know my own weaknesses well enough that I should be able to consider the weaknesses the Templars possess. Their armor alone is fraught with weaknesses that an unarmored man can take advantage of if he knows where to strike. The arrogance of an armored man will undo him; that I can attest to."

"You have a plan, then?" her lip crooked in a half smile.

"No," I stated, "we have a chance. Considering how most of my plans have erupted over the past weeks, it might be better to be without a plan. I was right though, charging in would be suicide…therefore we must force them to be the ones to charge."

She bowed to me then, with a vague flourish that smacked of mockery, "Your wish is my command, oh wise commander. However, before I take my leave to carry forth your orders, I have one point that niggles at my curiosity…."

The tone caused the back of my neck to itch and I suddenly became wary but my words remained flat, "What is it?"

"Perhaps my ears deceived me, but during your previous grumblings I heard other words that piqued my interest," the yellow eyes bored into me and the black hair ruffled slightly in the breeze, reminding me of raven feathers.

"What words?"

"I believe you mentioned a king. As I have already said, my hearing might have been in error… but it rarely is in error. So, it leads me to ask: what king could you possibly be referring to?"