Below the Peak (Sola)(21)
Nara’s expression turned grim while sadness squeezed her chest and dragged the corner of her lips down. Although she survived with some of the others and had defeated the enemy, the aftermath was not worthy of celebration.
She and other Murisa warriors stayed in Latrell for the last three days since the attack to help the town’s folks salvage what they could from the wreckage while some of the soldiers lent their strength to rebuild and to protect the villagers lest another ambush erupted. They had also buried several civilians and warriors that died in the crossfire which among them were men and women whom she had travelled with from Vessener to accomplish the job that had to send them to Latrell. Others who’d died were ones Nara had helped to assess and handpick from the small sparsely occupied town and trained with side by side to become the new guards of their own city once her troop was gone. In the four months of gruesome practice and discipline in different tactics of defence, she had become friends with some of the young men and women that had volunteered to sacrifice themselves to protect their families and town members.
Nara could almost hear the lament of the fallen buried down deep in the soil. What great unfairness! for them to be pitted against Kalil warriors for their first time to prove what they had learnt.
Left behind were families and friends struck with grief and in mourning. She could only imagine the carnage if she and other members of Elite had departed the town a day earlier…The Kalil warriors would’ve obliterated the entire city with everyone in it. The Kali was not known of sparing their targets.
Nara offered a quick prayer for the deceased. Odin to receive them with open arms in Valhalla and serve him as the great one deems. And the fallen Kalil warriors...be damned!
Fury coursed through her veins. Kalil onslaught was a great act of betrayal to a relationship that had been formed a military alliance for over a two hundred years ago in the times of the Dark War. The relationship which was made for a strategic purpose had become more than just an alliance of armies, friendship, trust and companionship had formed beyond the leaders and spread among the peoples of the two kingdoms. Nara closed her fingers into a tight fist and eyes hardening against the eventide. Whether the group of Kalil Warriors attacked to their own agenda or they were given orders to do so by their King and had led them to their downfall, she cursed them.
“Who is that you damn fervidly?” A voice asked behind her. Nara didn’t have to turn to know Barra stood a few feet behind her. But she turned around anyway, his presence a welcome distraction from the rage building inside her.
She kept her eyes on the captain as he approached her. He was in the dark cerulean armour of that fitted his muscular body frame well, a long sword strapped to his waist, and one arm cradled his helmet leaving his striking face, a three-day stubble which covered his lower face unhidden. The light evening breeze played with the short pale brown strands of hair that fell against his brows.
“Our distant brethren”, her voice was humourless only filled with pain and rage. Barra stood beside her. Nara tilted her head and closely looked at him in the dim light of the fading sun. His face was taut. Anger darkened his charming blue eyes, and a muscle jerked along his jaw, more than enough tale that he was mad and wrestling for control. It should be expected this from him after all he was the one who had been tasked with the responsibility by the General to oversee the training the small town’s new defence and lead their team back to the capital, once they were finished. She could see the running thoughts in his mind from the harsh set of his lips. Nara turned around to the previous position she had been when she was alone and continued to watch the busy villagers who now held oil lamps that illuminated their darkening surroundings as they worked. Silence fell between them until Barra spoke again. “I saw Schmerz the other day.”
Her head whipped toward him while every bone in her body went rigid at the mention of the Kalil General.
“What?” disbelief coloured her voice.
“He was with several men, probably more than twenty standing by over the hill. He appeared to have been monitoring his men's’ actions from a distant” Barra continued, his voice strained low. Her mouth gaped, stunned by the revelation.
“What’s this supposed to mean? If you saw General Schmerz, then the assumption that the men who attacked were acting on their own accord becomes invalid.”
The General’s mere presence changed everything. A troubling feeling tickled Nara’s senses, as she tried to foresee the General’s presence. The cutthroat General was known for his undying loyalty to his king. King Abasi.
“Schmerz wouldn’t issue an attack without his king’s approval”, Barra said after a momentary pause.
“I don’t understand. Do you think this is Abasi’s invitation to war?” she asked after a swallow of hesitation, she was not going to deceive herself no matter what she would like to think otherwise, there’s only one reason the General was there.
“I don’t know, but they would not have attacked without any reason. Regarding this from a military position, this is an invitation” Barra replied somberly, words she dared not to suggest.
Nara was quiet for a second as a wave of disbelief and trepidation washed over her. “I just cannot believe Abasi would want such a thing, not after everything our two kingdoms have endured together. It’s a heresy of the alliance the ones before built and had kept us alive!”
“Are you that ignorant?” Barra muttered in a tone laced with a drop of condescension that made her dislike him occasionally, had her brows furrowing.