The Toll of the Woods
The bandits here were no ordinary brigands. They were men he had trained with his own hands.
Drugged with a secret elixir passed down through his family, they had felt no pain and fought with a savagery that knew no fear.
And yet, before that knight, they dropped like scarecrows, one after another. His men weren't strangers to fighting mounted foes — so how!
"You empire-born country clod! Do you even know who it is you face?"
Even amid the chaos, the man's scream carried clearly. Johan dismissed it with a scoff.
"Bandits, aren't you?"
"The three brothers of House Rizarik! Learn the name of those you face!"
"Rizarik or whatever else — I couldn't care less. Die."
Johan sneered. If a man was going to shout his noble blood and beg to be taken hostage, he ought to have been a little more courteous. Brazen, too, carrying on like that after being caught mid-ambush.
But the Rizarik warrior apparently had no thought of surrender either. He leaned his body back as if to snap it, then twisted sharply. With a vicious hiss, a dagger came flying.
Ordinarily, knocking it aside with a surcoat-and-chain-mail-covered arm would have been more than enough. Thrown darts like that lacked the power to punch through armor. But Johan's instincts screamed a warning.
Thud!
He caught it on his shield, and a chill ran through the impact. The dagger had bitten into the shield itself — a strike that would have punched straight through had the shield not been steel.
A family technique?
What noble houses passed down the generations was not swordsmanship alone. It was easy to assume otherwise because of knights, but trace the oldest knightly houses back far enough and their roots sprawled everywhere — raiders, farmers, shepherds.
This was an age when knowledge, once learned, was hoarded rather than spread — and the more valuable the technique, the more jealously it was guarded.
That throwing technique was surely a family secret, and from the way the man boasted of his house, he was likely of knightly stock.
When Johan deflected the strike meant to skewer his throat, the warrior clicked his tongue and shouted.
"Come then! Come and have your try. You'll charge like the coward you are, won't you?"
The man had arms and legs freakishly long for his frame, and he moved with startling quickness. He bounced on his toes, ready to react the instant a horse came thundering in.
He's going for the horse.
What his enemy wanted, Johan would do the exact opposite of.
Johan leveled his lance and settled into a defensive stance. Karamaf ran up beside him and blocked the warrior's path forward.
That was the end of the warrior's options. Lunge for the horse, and Karamaf would bar the way; throw something, and Johan would answer with his lance.
The warrior spat curses at the sight of the wolf handling itself.
"Filthy, underhanded country clod!"
"I doubt the wolf understood that."
Johan tightened his grip on the lance, ready to hurl it and skewer the man the instant he showed an opening. The warrior must have sensed it, because he hesitated too. He had a warrior's instincts as well.
One mistake meant death!
"Come on! I said come at me!"
Johan ignored him, and the ignoring only stoked the warrior's fury further.
With their leader frozen, unable to advance or retreat, the rest of the bandits came apart entirely.
Men who should have scattered in rout fought on to the last, which dragged things out — but there had never been many of them to begin with. Soon enough they were overwhelmed and surrounded.
Only then did Johan speak, unhurried.
"You said House Rizarik, didn't you? Will you surrender?"
"You honorless cur! I'd sooner die than surrender! My brothers will avenge me."
"As you wish."
At Johan's wave, arrows came flying in from every direction. The Rizarik warrior flung himself aside, but he got no farther than a few paces before collapsing where he stood.
"Clean this up. Find out what sort of people House Rizarik are, and send a messenger into the woods. From the look of it, we may need to go in with support."
"It's always the wise man who ends up doing the cleanup."
"That's the way of the world."
The three brothers of Rizarik were one of the more infamous bandit companies. They had genuinely been a knightly house once — until the family fell into ruin and turned to brigandage.
Even among bandits, these fallen knight orders were the hardest kind to deal with.
They wore proper equipment, fought with real skill, and a few of the more lawless ones committed their outrages outright on their own former lands.
"There was a large-scale suppression campaign in the east about six years ago, and after they vanished around then we heard nothing of them... I never imagined they'd be here."
At Gurelik's words, Johan asked, "None of them worth a bounty or a ransom, then?"
"The house is bankrupt — the only ones who'd pay a ransom are those other brothers of his... and a bounty will be difficult too. Six years have passed, and any nobles they took captive will surely be dead by now."
"They took nobles captive?"
"Yes. They were adept at hostage-taking."
Not merely shaking down travelers for tolls and plundering goods, but abducting nobility and extracting ransom — as expected of knightly stock, they had been bold.
"We may have to send their head to the cities..."
Johan was surprised that a bandit picked up by chance turned out to be someone of such name — but what he had to do did not change.
He stationed soldiers near the edge of the woods and had them ready to move at a moment's notice. He would decide whether to advance once the messenger returned.
The bishop asked cautiously, "Should you not be going in now?"
"And what, exactly, would that gain us?"
"I only worry for your brother's reputation."
"You needn't worry, Your Excellency."
The bishop was fretting over nothing. Putting on airs here would do nothing for Johan's evaluation.
Cold composure would raise the inspector's opinion of him far more.
The messenger returned around the same time the mercenaries began emerging from the forest.
"The mercenaries are coming out!"
The runner burst from the tree line, and soon dozens of mercenaries crawled out one by one, in pitiful states. Johan clicked his tongue. He could well imagine how thoroughly they had been toyed with in there.
Played with, and nothing more.
The blessing was that the dead were few. Most were merely wounded or exhausted. That was only because they had held formation even while being led around by the nose.
Which showed they were no green recruits — the enemy had simply prepared the forest properly.
The mercenary captains wore expressions of fury and grief. And for them, one more shocking piece of news remained.
"There was an ambush?"
"There was. However focused one is on the hunt, letting your own camp be attacked — is that not the height of recklessness?"
"...Our apologies."
"We move on, then."
At Johan's words, the captains stared at him in disbelief.
Move on, with the bandits still holed up in the forest?
It was beyond belief. Surely a knight should step forward himself and see the matter ended.
"From what I can see, the bandits are hiding deep in the forest and will be difficult to root out. This force did not gather to hunt them, so if we linger here burning time, would that not be its own discourtesy?"
"But..."
One of the mercenary captains opened his mouth and faltered. He had no real rebuttal to Johan's words. And this was a fight that paid no wages — press it further, and resentment would spill hot and ugly through the ranks.
"...Still, there is honor to consider."
An elf spoke up — the Akiten-born elf Gurelik had mentioned, without question. Profit mattered, but honor mattered too.
If they simply withdrew now, the mercenaries who had gone into the forest would be made fools of.
"One of the three brothers was captured and beheaded — I'd say honor has been satisfied. They've lost one of their leaders; they'll be cowed and lying low."
"You — you caught one of the three brothers? When?"
"During the ambush."
The inspector nodded to vouch for the truth of it, and at that the captains' faces went hollow.
So it was true — luck like that let a man do anything. The one who had led the ambush had been one of the three brothers!
The youngest of them was said to be the wildest and most rash — he must have led the charge in person and been captured and killed on the spot.
"Anyone still objecting to the march?"
"And if there is?"
"Then so be it. We leave them behind. Anyone who wants to hunt bandits that badly is welcome to do as he pleases."
"......"
That ended the council.
Johan had coerced none of the captains, nor threatened them with authority. And yet they had been swept up without ever noticing it, unable to get a single word in edgewise.
The faces of the mercenary captains entering Mt. Sirandel were full of confusion and bewilderment.
Beautiful.
The Papal Court atop the mountain was at once lovely and formidably defended. Sheer cliffs ringed it on all sides, and the only way up was a single narrow, twisting path.
Moreover, rumor held that stores of food and water enough to last for years lay stockpiled within.
How did the Emperor ever breach this place?
Johan found himself genuinely curious.
"Brother. You must come at once."
They arrived, unpacked, and while the mercenary captains rested, a request came straight to Johan. He nodded. He had already guessed what this secret parley was about.
"This way..."
"Where is His Excellency Bishop Biagione?"
"His Excellency is resting."
"......"
Johan pitied the bishop. The man had been trembling with excitement at the honor of beholding the Pope with his own eyes — and the other miracle-faction bishops had refused to allow it.
"You must swear on God's name to keep secret all that happens from this moment."
"I swear it upon my honor and my faith."
"Thank you."
The inspector smiled warmly. He was a man who had already come to trust Johan completely — though Johan himself did not know that the inspector had sent a report on him during the night's camp before the forest.
"Mind your courtesies."
Inside the quiet, spacious chamber hung the scent of sulfur and myrrh. Without a word from anyone, Johan knew at once that the Pope lay within.
He entered and paid his respects. But his eyes crawled over the Pope, drinking in every detail.
Dead man or no, I can't tell which.
Kaenerna and Suetelg had both envied Johan bitterly. They, too, had longed to face the Pope in person as mages.
And Johan could feel it.
The immense mystery radiating from the body of the Pope as he lay like a corpse.
It was a gaunt, lifeless husk with not a flicker of vitality in it — but the mystery was real.
As Johan marveled, the bishops summoned him forward. The miracle-faction bishops.
"Ser Johan of House Eitz. Banneret of the Duke, executioner of trolls and demons. We believe you have come here out of that very devotion of yours."
"Soon the Count of Culia will be excommunicated, and his seat will lie empty. Before other wicked men seize it and oppress the serfs, might we ask you to step forward, my lord?"
"That is only fitting."
Johan spoke, concealing the surge of triumph welling up inside him. The bishops before him noticed nothing of his true heart.
They believed, without a shred of doubt, that Johan would fight as their faithful sword and shield.
The County of Culia was one of the most luscious prizes imaginable. Sitting on the southeastern edge of the Catalia Peninsula, it allowed easy passage between the two peninsulas and abundant access to maritime trade.
The Republic could offer support, and Lord Hormaric's island is not far away. Of all the lands I could claim now, I'd call it the best.
Not a scattering of small villages, but the full standing of a high lord at the very least.
...Though all of that was a matter for after everything was settled.
Should he fail, all that would remain to Johan were the corpses of shattered mercenaries and the enmity of the Emperor's faction. Once failure came, the diocese would sever its ties with him without hesitation.
"Then swear it. That you will fight solely for God, and for the faith."
"I will fight solely for God, and for the faith."
Johan kissed the blade of his sword and swore.
The diocese's method — hiring capable mercenaries and knights to fight its enemies — had always met with consistent success.
Those who succeeded did not cut their ties to the diocese. They needed its power too. But they had always been far too greedy to be mere puppets.
This time, though, it would truly be different. Everyone seated there was certain of it.
Of all the men they had ever entrusted with the task, none had combined such faith and such martial might!