The Jongurian Mission (6 page)

“That is a concern.
I suppose if the court agrees to begin trading again, then a delegation will be sent to Nanbo Island to propose the deal to the Jongurians.”

“Well, that
is
news,” Conn said again and with as much surprise.

All three s
tood in silence for a time, letting the prospect of trade with Jonguria and its impact upon the families of Eston fill their thoughts. Halam finally tapped his pipe bowl onto the edge of the horse trough and straightened.

“Well, Bryn, I think we’d better get back on the road.
We’ve still got a day in front of us before we reach Plowdon, and I’d like to be well along the Tillata River by the time we make camp tonight.”

“Yes, sir,” Bryn said
.

“Well, good luck to you two,” Conn said, shaking each of their hands.
“I know when I tell the other families about this, they’ll all be praying for you.”

“Thank you,” Halam said as he
pulled Juniper away from the trough and climbed up, then reached down his arm to help Bryn up. They cantered off down the road and left Eston behind as they continued to head northwest.

* * * * *

Past rolling fields they rode, and the scenery all began to look the same to Bryn. Some fields contained tall grasses which blew in waves with the wind, while others contained nothing but weeds. Occasionally they’d pass a farm along the road, men and women working, preparing for the spring planting. They would wave and the farmers would wave back, but on they continued. Sometimes they’d pass another rider or a wagon heading past them toward Eston. Again waves were exchanged, or a friendly ‘hello,’ each carrying onward to their destination. Not once did they see anyone else heading in their direction. Halam explained that it was a long road leading to the river, and that there were surly many other travelers like themselves spread out on it, just not within sight of them. The way the hills rolled up and down on the horizon limited their vision to a scant half-a league or less at all times.

The sun
was setting over their right shoulders by the time they finally made it to the Tillata River. It stretched before them as the Eston Road turned into the Tillata Road, which traveled east through the Tillata Wood to the Ipsalar Ocean, and west to Plowdon. The river itself was a good forty feet across, and flowed very rapidly. The water was light brown in color, the swiftness of the river stirring up all of the sediment underneath and roiling it around. When Bryn listened closely over the river’s roar, he could hear large rocks being pushed along the bottom.

Halam explained that at this time of year it was carrying all of the spring runoff from its source in the Montino Mountains and gathering force and momentum as it traveled down in elevation to the Ocean.
From here until Plowdon they’d see many more farms and small towns than they’d seen on the Eston Road, as the river provided much to the farmers. They stopped to let Juniper drink her fill in the river, both Bryn and Halam dismounting to stretch their legs. The river was icy-cold when Bryn dipped his hands in to drink, but the water tasted fresh and clean. He splashed a few handfuls into his face to wash away the dust of the road, and then they were once again back on Juniper, but now riding west on a new road.

“I know a good copse of trees where we’ll camp the night,” Halam said to Bryn.
They continued to ride as the sun set over the horizon in front of them, the sky overhead changing from pink, to orange, to red as the sun dipped into the ocean countless leagues away. The only sounds were the roar of the river on their right and Juniper’s hooves on the hard-packed dirt of the road underneath. It was fully dark when Halam pulled on the reins to turn Juniper off the road to their left and into a small stand of trees that Bryn couldn’t even see in the dark.

“We’ll camp here for the night, and continue on to Plowdon in the morning,” Halam said as he dismounted.
He handed Bryn his water skin, telling him to fill it in the river while he got started on a fire. Bryn had to follow the sound of the river, for it was much too dark to see more than a few inches in front of him. The rising moon shone on the blackness of the river, its reflection waving on the choppy current of the water. When Bryn returned with the water Halam had a fire going and Juniper was tied loosely to a tree, grazing on the tall grasses. Halam pulled the bread, cheese, and apples out of his pack, cutting them up and passing pieces to Bryn. They ate in silence, staring into the fire.

It was some time after they had both finished eating, while they sat and listened to the crackle of the fire and the roar of the river, when Bryn spoke.

“What can you tell me about my father, Uncle Halam,” he asked.

Halam looked over at Bryn, weighing the question, then stared back into the flickering light of the fire.
Quite some time passed, and Bryn figured that his uncle had nothing to say, but then Halam spoke.

“Shep, I think, was the smartest of us three brothers,” Bryn’s uncle replied, staring into the fire as he did so, “and that
’s why it came as such a surprise to Trun and I when he declared he was siding with the Regidians during the Civil War. Caught us completely off-guard, it did.
Now
, however, it doesn’t seem so far-fetched.

“
Shep had complained for years about how the Culdovians had governed. He was against the war with Jonguria from the start, seeing it as an end to the livelihood for countless small farmers and ordinary citizens. He turned out to be right on that one, but at the time, all most people could think of was fighting, me and your uncle Trun included.”

Halam took a deep sigh before continuing on.

“I still remember the night we sat around the table having dinner when Trun announced he’d joined the army and was heading to Jonguria to fight in the first offensive of the war, to be staged along the Baishur River. Boy how he and Shep argued over that! Shep couldn’t understand why he’d want to fight what he called ‘a rich-man’s war, and a poor-man’s fight.’ Trun couldn’t understand why Shep
wouldn’t
want to be a part of the defining moment of our lives. They argued into the night, neither able to convince the other of their point-of-view, or even to see the reasoning behind it. In the morning both were gone. Trun headed south to join up with the gathering army along the Plains River in Ithmia, and Shep headed who-knows where. It was the last time I saw both of them together for ten years.”

“It wasn’t until three years later, when I was getting ready to head-off to the front in Jonguria myself, that I saw your father again,” Halam continued.
“It was one of the coldest winters that I can remember hitting Tillatia, so cold you’d swear the ice fields of The Waste had took up residence further south for the year. All me dad and I could do was huddle inside by the fire day after day, doing our best to stay warm, counting the days until spring arrived. The thought of fighting in the hot weather of southern Jonguria had a mass-appeal for many young men living in northern Adjuria that year, let me tell you,” Halam said with a smile, looking into the fire and back into the past. “All of a sudden the door was thrown open, but instead of the wind giving us grief like we expected, there stood Shep, and with him a young girl, little older than you are now. They were damned-near frozen to the bone, they were, so we ushered them into the house and put them down right by the fire, helping them out of their cold, wet clothes and into something warm.”

“There was no mistakin
g that the girl was pregnant when we stripped her down to her small clothes. Her name was Lily, and she had long brown hair that fell in curls half-way down her back. Her eyes were the color of the green spring grass of the fields, and she had a face that would melt your heart. She was a sweet thing, didn’t say much, but then I never had the chance to know her.”

“They had met in Allidia, where Shep was working for the past three years on the fishing boats that trawled the Bargoes Lake, where she was a fisherman’s daughter.
When she unexpectedly got pregnant, her family was outraged, seeing as how she wasn’t married and the man that had done it to her was no more than a wandering hand-for-hire. Shep decided the best thing to do was up and leave, convincing her to go with him. They headed east, doing what odd-jobs they could, until they made it back to Tillatia. It had become obvious that the only way Shep was going to be able to support her and the child was by joining the fight with Jonguria, those being the only jobs paying anything during the war. That’s what brought him back to the farm, to drop Lily off, and to head toward the front.”

“It wasn’t more than two days that we were all together before Shep and I
had to head south to Dockside in Portinia to enlist in the army. It didn’t seem to be much of a goodbye that Lily and Shep had, just a few soft-spoken words between them and a kiss, and then we mounted our horses and rode south.”

“Shep and I both figured we’d end up in the besieged city of Bindao on the southern Jongurian coast, and, even though we knew the fighting
there would be fierce, we were happy that we’d both be together. As it turned out, however, there had been a recent call-up for additional troops to man the defenses at Fadurk on the Isthmus, where, it was believed, the Jongurians were planning an attack. I was sent to Bindao, seeing as I had no experience in wagin’ war; all that was needed there were fresh bodies to man the walls. You father, on the other hand, was sent to Fadurk, as he’d picked up more skills during his travels. We made our goodbyes on the docks of Dockside where I boarded a ship to take me away to Bindao for the remaining seven years of the war.”

“Shep arrived in Fadurk just in time for the attack by the Jongurians, who had shipped men across the Ithmian Sea and landed them on the other side of the Barrier Mountains.
Fadurk had been expecting an attack, but they thought it would come from over the Isthmus, not from behind them. Nearly the whole garrison was wiped out, caught off-guard by the attack, and the city overrun. A company of men, including your father, managed to make it out of the city, setting up a defensive ring in the mountains. They fought as well as they could against the superior numbers of the Jongurians now holding the strongest defenses in Adjuria, but it made little difference. It wasn’t until reinforcements were sent to aid the former defenders of Fadurk that the city was retaken and the Jongurian army sent running for their ships on the coast. They ran to those ships not to escape, however, but to re-supply. Soon they’d set up a well-fortified base in the mountains from which to keep up attacks, as well as an area to receive fresh troops and supplies from sea.”

“And that
’s how it was for many years. The stalemate set in, and attacks were made by both sides on the enemy defenses, but no real gains were made by either. Unrest was growing amongst the citizens, and calls were being heard at the royal court in Culdovia for the war to be brought to a swift end. There were even calls being made for a change in the royal line, something that hadn’t been done since the first Civil War nearly fifty years earlier. It was decided that one more major offensive operation would be planned to shake things up, and hopefully provide the push needed to bolster the men’s spirits and drive the nail into the coffin of the Jongurian defenses for good.”

“That offensive was to be staged from Fadurk, across the
Isthmus, against the city of Waigo. An army would be formed in Fadurk and sent across the Ithmian Desert, while an additional army would be sent by sea to land in the Ximen province in Jonguria where they’d then march overland around the Xishan Mountains to attack the city from behind. The two attacks were to occur simultaneously, allowing us to take the city, and with it a wide avenue in which to send reinforcements flooding across the Isthmus and into Jonguria.”

“Since Shep had been one of the survivors of the siege of Fadurk, and
played a large part in retaking the city, he was selected to lead a company of men across the Isthmus. It would be a difficult task, as that time of year was the worst possible to travel the narrow desert waste between continents. The Ithmian Desert was harsh and unyielding at all times, but especially during the summer, when the heat of the day would cook men in their armor, and the cold of the night would freeze their sweat-soaked clothes to their bodies. Shep didn’t complain, seeing it as his duty to his men and his country to lead an assault.”

“Nothing went right, however.
The troops marching over the Isthmus lost substantial amounts of men to the heat of the desert. Corpses lay strewn the entire length between the two cities. The march overland in Ximen proved difficult as well, but with fewer losses. Those troops arrived at Waigo first, and proceeded to attack, not knowing the other wing of the siege had not yet arrived. Able to focus their attention on only one front, as opposed to the Adjurian plan of bringing the fight to two, the Jongurians were able to bring their full might down on the attacking forces, dealing devastating losses to the Adjurians.

“
When the forces marching across the Isthmus finally made it, they found that the attack from Ximen had proceeded without them and failed, the Adjurian army already fleeing south to their ships. Your father was one of the lucky ones who made it across the Isthmus to attack the city, but it proved a futile undertaking, as the city of Waigo turned its attention to these new attacks from the west, and made quick work of the few numbers that were left. A retreat was called for, and the soldiers that could headed north to the Ithmian Sea to be picked up by the Adjurian navy, while those on the Isthmus began to trek back along its coast in hopes of being picked up by the navy’s boats as well.”