Phidestros felt his guts twist as the vanguard of his Iron Band rode by a burning farmhouse. A child lay on the steps, his skull split.
In the farmyard itself, three of Roxthar's Holy Investigators were "questioning" a Hostigi woman, no doubt the child's mother. The Investigators wore hooded white robes with Styphon's red sun-wheel over the breast. The robes were well stained with mud and blood-some of the blood long dry.
"They can fight women and children well enough!" Geblon growled. "Where were Styphon's swine when we charged Kalvan's artillery batteries at Ardros Field!"
Phidestros leaned out of his saddle to grip his friend's hand before he could draw a pistol and do something foolish. Not that most of the Iron Band and Phidestros himself didn't feel the same way. Phidestros shut his ears against the woman's screams. At the very least: Why in the name of the Twelve True Gods couldn't the Investigators find private places to torture and maim their victims?
It was Archpriest Roxthar, of course: Roxthar, with the fanatic's blindness to the opinions of others and total sense of his own rightness. Roxthar had better learn discretion before the Grand Host itself began hunting Investigators, instead of Hostigi!
Phidestros led veterans, men accustomed to anger, violence, wounds, and death in all its myriad of forms. But, in the end, they were professional soldiers who didn't shirk from their duty, no matter how onerous. What they were not were butchers who reveled in killing like weasels among goslings.
Curse and blast the Holy Investigation and its heinous works! They were dragging honorable soldiers down into the same kind of sty they enjoyed, without doing Styphon's House on Earth all that much good. These priests needed to learn what his soldiers had learned in this campaign, if they wished to grow old: men made desperate by fear will fight to the last.
Phidestros twisted his head and flexed his shoulders as much as his armor would allow, easing his stiff muscles. He should be the happiest man in the Great Kingdoms; instead he felt more fear of the future than he had felt facing Kalvan and his Army of Hos-Hostigos.
Kalvan was not invincible. Ardros Field proved that. The greatest victory since Simocles the Great defeated the Ruthani Confederation at Sestra more than four centuries ago; won by a commander who three years ago was lucky to count two hundred soldiers following his banner! A victory so great that Styphon's House had sent out messengers to every Temple of Styphon in the Five Kingdoms with orders to celebrate this triumph with a feast of thanksgiving in every village, town and city!
The Grand Host had already set men to garrisoning captured castles. Fifteen thousand of the best were hard on the heels of the fleeing Royal Army of Hos-Hostigos. Phidestros knew he should be riding with those men instead of playing steward to Archpriest Roxthar and his Investigators. But two days earlier a letter had arrived from Great King Lysandros saying that he was on his way to Hostigos and there was to be a victory celebration in Hostigos Town with the investiture of the new Prince of Greater Beshta, "which includes the lands falsely claimed as the Princedom of 'Sashta' by the Usurper," to be "in attendance." So Lysandros was a man of his word. Good. Now, his first proclamation as Prince of Beshta would be a complete Ban of the Investigation in his territory.
As for his investiture as Prince of Beshta, not even Hadron's Hounds could keep him away!
He'd also learned from the letter that traveling with Lysandros was the new and rightful Prince of Hostigos, the newly crowned Prince Sthentros! Phidestros' head was still swimming with that news. He had heard rumors before leaving Hos-Harphax about the Baron's daughter and Lysandros, but had thought them malicious gossip at best. Maybe not? The wench did have a way about her and was comely indeed. As to whether or not Lavena was the spitting image of Great Queen Rylla-he would leave that to those who had seen them both. True, he'd been less than a horse length away from Great King Kalvan, but had never seen the Great Queen up close.
After the investiture, let Grand Master Soton besiege Tarr-Hostigos while Phidestros pressed the pursuit until the Usurper Kalvan was no more! The Grand Host was large enough for two credible forces, one to besiege Tarr-Hostigos, the other to run down Kalvan and his army.
As long as Kalvan was alive, he might rise again. A man who could conjure a Great Kingdom out of not much more than the gods' own air was no ordinary foe.
But try telling that to anyone else, including Grand Master Soton, who ought to know better! Phidestros could not understand why Soton deferred so much to Roxthar. The Grand Master was not only the highest-ranking soldier of Styphon's House, he was an Archpriest in his own right, the Investigator's equal in priestly rank. It would not be an answer easily come by, either. Undue curiosity about the affairs of the Investigation was a short road to a charge of 'heresy' and a nasty, brutal death.
The Iron Band started down the last slope into Hostigos Town, laid out on its alternating hills and dales. In the distance, Phidestros saw the Hostigos Gap, with Tarr-Hostigos perched atop two spurs of the formidable mountain to the right of the Gap.
The first prong held the main castle surrounded by walls and gun towers. The second and higher spur held the great keep and tower with its own walls. Removing Tarr-Hostigos from the path of the Grand Host was not going to be as simple as taking a splinter from a child's foot, regardless of what Roxthar thought. If Phidestros had his choice, he would leave a large detachment to blockade the castle and let starvation do the rest.
But he was merely a Grand Captain-General, in a war run by priests. Also a Captain-General who answered to a Great King who'd mortgaged everything but his concubines' shifts to Styphon's House.
It was time to send the priests back to their temples and the counselors back to their castles so his soldiers could get on with the business of finishing off Kalvan.
As they rode down the Great King's Highway toward Hostigos Town, Phidestros was pleased to see only two columns of black smoke rising from the heart of Hostigos. Two years earlier, there wouldn't have been a third of the town left untouched by fire and looters. Now, many of the former mercenaries had been brought into the Army of Hos-Harphax, or were well on their way to becoming 'regular' soldiers-three winters of hard war could do that.
Geblon said, "There'll be dry beds in Hostigos Town."
"You don't sound surprised."
Geblon sniggered. "Not after what you told the Grand Host the morning after Ardros Field." In mock stentorian tones, he said, " 'We need all the buildings we can get, so no arson when you reach Hostigos Town. We can always burn the place down when we leave.'"
A rider galloped up, shouting for Phidestros, saving him from a reply. From the rider's silvered armor and black-caparisoned horse with a silver sun-wheel on each quarter, he was a Knight of the Holy Order of Zarthani Knights. Soton is nearby, he thought.
"Hail, Grand Captain-General Phidestros! I am Commander Lythar of the Holy Lance, with a message from Grand Master Soton."
"Greetings, Commander Lythar. What is your master's pleasure?"
"The Grand Master requests your presence upon yonder hill. The Commander raised his visor and pointed to a nearby hill. A Blade of sixty Knights stood in attendance to the diminutive figure of the Grand Master, whose blackened armor made a stark contrast to their polished finery.
Phidestros nodded to Geblon. The General told off sixty of the Iron Band and placed them around his Captain-General until Phidestros felt like a babe in its nurse's arms. He held his peace; Geblon would be like a she-wolf with one cub toward his captain until the day he died.
It took a few moments for the horses of Phidestros' party to get used to rough ground again, after several candles on the smooth paving of Kalvan's Great King's Highway. Kalvan is a hard man not to respect, even in defeat, was Phidestros' thought. Many saw the wisdom of such roads. None were built, until Kalvan came.
If these be demonic arts, let me see more of them!
A quarter-candle took Phidestros up the hill to Soton's outpost. Phidestros dismounted and advanced to greet Soton, as General Geblon arrayed the Iron Band facing the Knights.
The two commanders touched palms. Soton pointed to Tarr-Hostigos.
"A hard nut to crack, aye, Captain-General?"
"One to give even a red squirrel a bit of a quarrel. It's big enough to hold fifteen thousand men and supplies for a year, if they don't mind horseflesh. We may see snow before we see a breach in those walls!"
"Rest easy, Captain-General. We've interrogated some prisoners-not as the Investigation does it, but by the old ways. Kalvan's left only a skeleton garrison, five hundred men and some of those wrinkled like crab apples. We should have the castle invested in a few days. Then we can see about tracking Kalvan all the way to the Sea of Grass if we must!"
Phidestros wanted to sing, dance, and embrace Soton, but dignity and caution shaped his tongue to a question. "Will His Bloodiness let us show such wisdom?"
"Guard your tongue, Phidestros. Great King Lysandros will be here soon; let him wrestle Archpriests while we tend our wounded."
"Yes, Grand Master. I have seen the fate of the wounded Hostigi women and children who defy the Holy Investigator."
Soton's face paled and he looked away. "It is our duty to obey the Temple's will," he muttered. "This war against women and babes is not my choice, either, Phidestros. There are changes taking place in Balph you know nothing about. When the Hostigi heresy is scourged from the land, the Investigation will be ended."
If you believe, that, Phidestros thought, you aren't half the man I'd thought.
Phidestros lowered his voice so the guards could not overhear. "It's not just innocent blood we have to wash from our hands. This archfiend Roxthar with his sermons of One True God has the priests of Galzar so stirred up you'd think they had wasp nests under their wolfheads! There's talk of a Ban of Galzar and rumors of Highpriests on their way from Agrys City- did you know that?"
"Yes, the Holy Investigator lacks tact."
"He lacks humanity! He is a wolf in human guise with a taste for human flesh. Rein him in or I cannot guarantee that all my troops will not do their own investigation. Already several troops of mercenaries have resigned their contracts, saying this is an unjust war! Highpriest Olmnestes has giving them his Blessing. Now, unless this torture is halted, he threatens to leave with all the priests of Galzar-that would bleed this army worse than horse leeches or Kalvan's rifles!"
Soton's face hardened. "There will be no more desertions. I will have four Temple bands of Styphon's Own Guard act as a rearguard to the Grand Host. Those who lack the mettle to fight this war will taste Styphon's Own steel!"
Phidestros couldn't keep the distaste he felt off his face. He spat on the ground.
"My young friend, when you war against Daemons, you use the finest weapons you can find. Roxthar has tempered Styphon's House and brought a unity of purpose no one else could have forged."
Phidestros let the Grand Master have the last word, but this argument was a long way from being finished.
"The commanders are to be billeted at Ptosphes' summer palace in Hostigos Town," Soton continued. "I'll be going there myself, as soon as we finish this drawing of Tarr-Hostigos."
He pointed at a Knight sitting on a stump with a slate and charcoal in hand. Phidestros peered over the man's shoulder, to see a fine rendering of the castle, with every tower, battlement and gate clearly shown.
I'd best round up Kalvan's mapmakers as soon as we're settled in. Some may have fled, and doubtless Soton will want his share. I'll have the Iron Band search them out. But, please Galzar, let this be something soldiers can settle between themselves without listening to priests babbling about demonic arts!
A hundred petty matters kept Phidestros and his Iron Band out of Hostigos Town for much of the morning. By the time they'd covered the last march of Old Tigo Road, the few fires were out. The streets were deserted, except for soldiers and chain gangs of prisoners, led by Roxthar's Investigators and Styphon's Own Guard, resplendent in their silvered armor and red capes.
The chain gangs all seemed bound for Hostigos Square, which Phidestros found already half-filled with slave pens bursting with Hostigi prisoners. The palace itself was garrisoned by Guardsmen standing practically shoulder-to-shoulder, with Investigators darting in and out like rats from a half-eaten corpse. Phidestros led the Iron Band toward the palace, ignoring the curses and threats of Styphoni brusquely pushed aside.
The Iron Band replied only with silence, and occasionally with a hand rested lightly on a pistol butt. Before the Iron Band reached the palace, the Styphoni were giving way without protest.
As Phidestros dismounted, he knew one thing. He'd be damned if he billeted any of his men in this nest of temple-rats! He'd say that the siege demanded all his attention and find quarters elsewhere. Otherwise the Iron Band would start the war against the Investigators here and now, and he'd be lucky to end up back commanding a company of every other captain's leavings!