A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor
Chapter 1847 - 1847: Old Boulders - Part 4

An illusion is what it was, the illusion of a strong position. Against such forces of Command, now that he could barely see them – or at least, expressions of them – Hod had to tilt his head in wonder, and ask how it was that a single man like Tavar had been able to keep his army so united, when it was the likes of Oliver Patrick, and General Blackthorn that he was facing off against. And perhaps, even Verdant Idris… Perhaps he too might have known the first flickerings of Command. When Hod looked at him, he could see the men under Verdant were well inspired, but they seemed more inspired by their General, than they did the Colonel above them, and it was Verdant himself that seemed to encourage that very thing.

A flood it was that was building, a flood of something against glassy walls. Hod could feel it so strongly that the pressure made his head threaten to explode. It made him drunk on his feet. He swayed enough that a nearby soldier had to steady him with a hand and a worried look.

"Are you quite alright, Minister?"

"I cannot be all right, soldier. I must be the left and the centre as well," Hod said, pushing him away with a barely stifled giggle, well aware that he was acting strangely, though only part of him now seemed to be able to care.

The flood that he was looking for, it was right there, in the pieces of potential, those very students that Tavar himself had helped raise, and all that was beyond them. It was in General Blackthorn too, who had never quite managed to find a battlefield as glorious as this, despite his eternal searching. Now it was obvious, obvious why it was that the General fought so tirelessly, and so aggressively. He was right there, in the very storm that he had searched so long for. He would fight until the skin tore from his muscles, and his muscles tore from his bones, so he might tickle those glorious heights that he had longed for, and wrestle with that glorious foe that he had dreamed of.

They were all there, and waiting, yet somehow, they did not move. It all poured out of them, the water of potential, and all their significances, but the currents did not align and properly express themselves. They were caught up in the battlefield as it was, and in the old ways. "But this is the Time of Tigers, gentlemen, all gets melted. That which was solid once more becomes fluid."

He saw in his hands, the tools that were needed to orchestrate that, the power to build up that might current that would shatter the illusion of control that Tavar in all his greatness barely hung on to. He could see the magnitude of the man, enough to be equal to that of three or four other Generals together, but the dynamism of sudden change, no man could easily resist that.

So it was Hod gave the command, and so it was, he felt a Command of his own – Command from a man that had never properly known the battlefield, who had only ever truly known strategy, and whom most people did not even like to look at, much less listen to. He saw it spoken to them, and he gave them that great push of direction that they so desired.

"FIGHT YOUR OWN BATTLES, I ASK YOU! FIGHT YOUR OWN!"

If it was merely those words alone that Hod had shouted, none would have understood him. They would have frowned, and asked for more concrete orders. But with the Command that tainted him temporarily, a man who, more than any other, seemed to long for the greatness of those Tigers that had long since been prophesied, it struck them with an obviousness.

Oliver felt himself cool, as if struck by cold water. His head had been stretching itself. He had fought, as if he could think his way towards a solution. As soon as he had finished his engagement on the flanks of his enemy, and set them to scrambling, he had placed the pressure of seeing the job done on himself, and his eyes had scanned the world around him desperately, looking for that hidden solution, and hating himself or the fact that they were unable to make anything properly of it.

That, it seemed, was his own misapprehension. There were creatures that he had relied on even to see that spot of magic done. He would go a step further, and call them magic in and of themselves. When he fought alongside them, the wind howled, the Gods approved. They were Patrick soldiers, but they were not a mere extension of Oliver Patrick himself.

Part of it must have noted it, when he so easily gave Verdant such a high degree of command. Another part must have already accepted it, when he placed his ultimate faith in Nila and her bow to see him kept safe in his latest battling against Germanicus. He already knew it, he already very much accepted it, but he knew not how to put it into action. Not until Hod had seen it spoken, and Tavar had applied so much pressure that there seemed no other course but this. By Tavar's overwhelming might, he was guided towards it.

Like Oliver Patrick himself, the men under him had begun to yearn for one thing. The freedom to see their own will on the battlefield manifest. It wasn't as if Oliver had consciously put his control over them either – but they had simply followed the natural order of command, put down for centuries by the soldiery before them. The soldiers obeyed their Sergeants, and the Sergeants obeyed their Captains. That was the way things went.

Could one dare, despite that, to hold together more freedom? Could there exist a place that allowed men to move, more than mere discipline did? Could an army still function as a unified body if the men were allowed that degree of freedom that rendered them almost individuals?

They'd fallen to fighting in such a manner many times before, simply out of necessity, but they had never quite gone all the way. They hadn't restructured their army to match it. They hadn't really even known quite why it had worked. Not until Hod himself had just seen it pointed out. And until they had seen the same longing in their General, and in the way other Generals saw fit to treat him.