“Yes,” Sibéal said, seeming relieved. “We just… don’t get much practice.”
Drafters who intentionally didn’t draft? What was the point? “One moment,” Kip said, and he pulled Tisis aside. Quietly he asked, “Ghosts?”
“It’s a school for drafters that’s not under the authority of the Chromeria. A long time ago, when the Chromeria was consolidating control of all drafters, they declared everyone at such schools to be heretics. Those who stayed were often declared dead by their families, either to disown them or to escape Chromeria punishment for that family member’s apostasy. Thus, Shady Grove–trained drafters became referred to as Shades, or Ghosts. Since they also tend to keep a low profile lest the Chromeria renew its hunt for them, the name stuck.”
“The Chromeria hunted them?” Kip asked.
“The Magisterium, actually. Luxors.”
Kip turned back to Sibéal and Conn Arthur. “You like blunt speaking, right?”
“It’s usually faster,” Conn Arthur said. “Isn’t it?”
All right, Kip Blunderbuss. Come out and play. “They branded you heretics. Are you?”
The conn took a displeased moment to digest that, but then said, “We love Orholam and follow him.”
“Not to elide a painful history and many hard feelings,” Sibéal Siofra interjected. “We do have some doctrinal differences, and don’t submit to the Magisterial assertion of primacy.”
Orholam’s crooked little toe, that permanent smile of hers was hard to get past. Kip thought her true expression was an uncertain, placating smile. He sighed.
“Good old Chromeria. Never failing to make its friends fearful and its enemies bold,” Kip said. “Well, then. This is war, not an admissions test on doctrine for the Magisterium. Let’s get to work.”
He broke them up into teams to start building skimmers for everyone. He organized the correct numbers of drafters of each color needed and put Ben-hadad in charge of overseeing the creation of the skimmers themselves, letting the young genius figure out the most efficient number and composition of skimmers given the number of people they had to move and the skill or lack thereof of the drafters available.
Kip went to work learning the disposition of his new forces. Most of the Ghosts here were those who had no homes anymore. Either they’d made Shady Grove their home, or their families’ homes were in areas that the White King had already captured.
With Cruxer and Conn Arthur, Kip went over a map that Tisis was able to draw of Deora Neamh and its environs. She’d never visited, but she’d studied Blood Forest geography extensively, and she could draw. They showed the map to all the Ghosts who’d ever visited the town, and amended it as necessary.
Kip stared at the map. The problem with it was that the land was hilly—it was home to a tall waterfall—but the map itself did a poor job of showing the elevation changes. “What do they want from this town?” Kip asked.
“Slaves. Loot. The regular, I suppose,” Conn Arthur said.
“No,” Cruxer said. “There’s a water mill here, below the base of the falls. Where do farmers keep their grain before and after it’s been milled?”
They found someone who’d visited the town. He sketched a warehouse a ways down the rocky river, at the first place where the river was navigable for larger boats and barges. There was a good road between the mill and the docks. He hadn’t even thought to add it in when shown the map before, because it was outside the scope of the paper.
Kip didn’t know how long he stared at the map. They had no idea how many men and wights would be attacking the city. If it really was a foraging party, it would contain a small force of fighters meant to cow the populace, but be made up mainly of laborers and camp followers pressed into service to haul the grain back to the main camp.
“Breaker,” Cruxer said. It was almost noon, and Kip was still turning things over in his mind, visualizing the terrain. “Ben-hadad says they’re finished. He’s launching the skimmers now.”
Kip didn’t move. “The thing about prototypes?”
“Milord?”
“They fail.”
“Well, these aren’t the first skimmers that Ben’s built.”
“They’re the first ones he’s watched inept drafters build for him, with so many going at once that he can’t watch every step.”
Just then a spate of curses rang out from the water’s edge. They turned and saw an entire section of hull had disintegrated and a skimmer was sinking rapidly.
Kip grinned at Cruxer.
“Well, you don’t have to be smug about it,” he said. “If we don’t get there in time, we might lose our new allies, you know.”
“Eh, the prophecy says we can get there on time; therefore we will, right?”
Cruxer grimaced. “I don’t think it works like that. And maybe the Third Eye was lying to us just to get us to try. She could even be working for the Color Prince for all we know, and we’re going to our destruction.”
“Corvan Danavis wouldn’t let that happen,” Kip said.
“Well, maybe these Ghosts are lying about what Corvan and the Seer said.”
“How would they know such a lie would work on us?” Kip asked.
Cruxer just frowned.
“Why so dour, Crux? It’s not like you.”
The young commander rubbed his face. “Didn’t sleep well last night.”
Well, Tisis and I didn’t do anything to keep you awake, that’s for sure. “That’s not so rare. Doesn’t usually leave you grumpy.”
Cruxer pursed his lips. But then he spoke. “I had this terrible nightmare about Commander Ironfist. It felt like a premonition. We were both wounded from fighting wights or something. But then we turned on each other. We killed each other, Breaker.” He shook his head. “It felt so real.”
“If it’s any consolation,” Kip said, “I don’t believe you could kill Ironfist.”
“I know, I can’t imagine anything that would turn us against each other.”
“No, I mean the man could kick your ass while sipping kopi and reading the day’s briefings and never spill a drop.”
An unwilling grin broke over Cruxer’s face. “You’re a real flesh protuberance, you know that, right?”
“I got your back,” Kip said, patting his friend’s shoulder. “But if you fight Ironfist, I’ll have it from way, way back.”
“Thanks a lot.” Cruxer’s face fell again, though. “I wish he were here. I wish he were leading us, not me. I mean, no offense to you, Breaker. But you know what I mean, right? I’m not making sense, I’m too tired. Sorry.”
“I know what you mean. I wish he were here…” Kip forgot what he had been about to say next as something occurred to him. “Huh.”
He pulled on some spectacles and started drafting, swapping spectacles as necessary. In a few minutes he had a pretty good luxin model of the map they’d created.
Cruxer had immediately summoned the people who’d helped with the map earlier, and Kip held the luxin open so they could make the model accurate together.
The leadership had gathered by the time Kip expanded the model to include the surrounding countryside for several leagues.
“Avoid battle, seek victory,” Kip said. He remembered that from one of Master Danavis’s books. “They’re here for grain. Conn Arthur, you mount an attack on the warehouse. You come straight from the forest here.”
“I can do it, but why do we want to go after grain? You plan to keep it? If we undermine support from the people…”
“To win, the Blood Robes need that grain, so if we threaten it, they have to defend it. Try not to actually set the warehouses on fire, though. You decide how many people you need to make the attack credible, but it must fail. Fall back and regroup—probably here—within sight of them, giving them time to call for reinforcements.”
“And… what?” Conn Arthur said. “There’s no way to get around them in this valley without being seen.”
“We don’t attack them at all. This isn’t a battle; it’s an attack.”
“I don’t…” Cruxer said.
Kip asked, “What’s the trouble with moving huge amounts of grain?”