A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor
Chapter 1544 - 1544: Where Art The Fire - Part 9

Oliver didn't know whether he had acted dishonourably yet, though he was quite sure that he walked the line. He balanced the tightrope, between honour and effectiveness, and the result was where he stood, not knowing quite what he was, or even entirely what was expected of him. He knew he ought to move to carry the responsibility that he had gathered, for the sake of their campaign, but what even was the path towards effectively doing that?

He wasn't so sure. He couldn't hold the idea in his head. It was one of those problems that he thought he might not be able to solve by simply thinking about. And so he kept moving. He found a tree that he had a familiarity with, for all the time that he had spent perched in its branches, and he threw himself up it, climbing from branch to branch, with a recklessness that seemed intent on inviting death, especially with each of the branches covered in slippery snow and ice.

He went higher than he would have felt comfortable doing years ago, beyond where the branches had grown thin and threatened to snap. He went high enough that he began to invade the territory of birds. One little wood pigeon cooed at him, telling him off, as it sat puffed out, in its little nest.

"Apologies," Oliver told it with a smile, circling around the other side of the tree to climb beyond it.

As he climbed higher, he could see more of the world, beyond the trees that had once bounded him in, and down into the town, just below the mountain.

Once that might have struck Oliver as a beautiful sight, but now it struck him as an intimidating one. Where once there had only been the town of Solgrim, with its little houses, dotted together, and defenceless, there was now a large wooden ring wall, complete with ramparts for the defenders to stand on – and on which, currently, there stood fifty Patrick men, standing guard and patrolling.

It had gone from a settlement, into something that approached a fortress. Oliver wondered if this was how the Yarmdon had looked down on their town from a distance. He wondered what they would think now if they saw it. Certainly, they wouldn't think that they could take it with a mere few hundred men – not when there were already a good few hundred men sitting in Solgrim in wait, along with the mean-looking wall serving as protection.

The defences of Solgrim were one thing, and it was almost as if Oliver intentionally looked at them, to avoid looking further to his left. To look to his left set his heart to pounding. Only from here, and this height, could he see all the tents that were gathered together all at once.

He forced himself to look and he forced himself to acknowledge the fear in his heart. It brought to mind a wave of dizziness that almost set him tumbling out of the tree. His hands shook. All those tents, hundreds and hundreds, betraying the near ten-thousand men that were gathered there, from peasantry, all the way to nobility.

Once, that might have made him smile, when he knew they were gathered for the intents of tournament, but now, even from a distance, one could tell that their purpose had changed. One could feel the quiet violence in their tension. One could see the stiff way that soldiers now marched along the roads in the encampment. One could see the firm perimeter that had been set up, with Blackwell, Karstly, Skullic, Blackthorn and all the soldiers of the different generals purposefully selected, and purposefully put on guard together, so that they might share the smallest of burdens, and signify their alliance.

As Oliver watched, he saw a bird take flight, rising up from beyond the tents, so that Oliver could not pinpoint exactly the spot that it had flown from. The broad-winged raven flew higher and higher, gathering air under itself with a few powerful flexing of its wings. It was a rich bird. Even normal nobles used crows, but apparently, with the state of the snow – though it had begun to die down again, after a brief spurt of heaviness – required a raven to navigate.

Before it could get any higher, there was a sudden flash of movement, and then it was set to falling out of the sky. The quick hand of gravity brought it crashing after only the briefest of struggles. It required a quickness in eyesight to understand the cause. Oliver only just barely caught a glimpse of the arrow that had plunged its way into its body. And then he saw the other arrow that had been sent after it, just a fraction of a second later.

He murmured quietly to himself, remembering the orders that Lord Blackwell had given the previous day. No bird was to be allowed to land or leave their encampment without official orders. Apparently, this bird did not have the required official orders.

It was the right decision to make, but it highlighted the distrust amongst their union. The surprise nature of their war declaration was their only advantage, and Blackwell was going to whatever lengths were necessary in order to keep it so. He was as certain as the rest of them that there were noblemen currently under their banner that would have much rather been on the march home, in service to a different Lord. Oliver supposed that the fallen snow, and the coming of winter certainly did not help their opinions.

Only a fool would choose winter as their time to declare war, he could imagine Professor Volguard saying, when they were back at the Academy – but he had noted that, at the strategy meeting yesterday, the professor had remained unusually quiet. Apparently, there were times when one ought to break the most fundamental of rules. Though it was just barely breaking into the beginnings of winter, they didn't have a choice. The explosive rage of rebellion had fallen suddenly. None could have predicted for it to arrive when it did.