A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor
Chapter 1906 - 1906: A Timely March - Part 3

He had to disgrace himself in properly shouting. It wasn't the graceful bellow of a General. He hadn't spoken enough that morning for his first words to come out properly. He felt his voice crack as he repeated that same word. "Gentlemen!"

And with the cracking came a clenching of his teeth. Never had he been more aware of the oddness of his youth in such high command then. It brought a flush to his cheeks. These men, seized from Tavar as they were, how disgraced they must have felt to be put in his hands of all people. An army that was now composed nearly entirely of foreign elements, apart from those Patrick soldiers that Oliver still had.

He looked down the lines as he moved on the back of his white horse – a horse that finally, he'd come up with a name for, and he'd done it at the worst possible time, when he ought to have been thinking of other things. When the matter of their current situation had haunted him. He'd chirped up, distracted. "Nelson," he'd said to Verdant.

"Pardon, my Lord?"

"For the horse," Oliver said. Even Verdant had been stunned by the abruptness of it. But the beast had been with Oliver through some significant encounters now. It seemed half-monster, at times. Other men could hardly get near it, but Oliver made a point of sneaking it an apple every now and then. A good horse, a strong horse, a horse more than worthy of a name. And, worthy of distraction, for when he ought to have been speaking to his men, Oliver's mind once more drifted to that beast.

For his youthly command, he felt as if he had the mind of a retiree. His thoughts were slow, aged, and chaotic. He couldn't focus on the task in hand. The fog of the air existed entirely as thickly in his own mind as it did in the world around him.

Those Tavar men loved him not. They held no great degree of respect for him, no loyalty, and why ought they to? They'd fought against him, they respected his skill, but they did not love him. Once more, why would they be able to love a man that had been instrumental in seeing their Lord killed?

The Treeants were the odd ones for it, for they did not love him, but the respect they held for him, that was something else entirely. They were ready to die for a man that they had never fought under before. Ready to die for him – but that was the bare minimum that a General required from his soldiers. Good Patrick soldiers went beyond that. They bid that death wait, and they thwarted the very laws of nature, so that they might further their General's purpose.

And when Oliver found them, those good strong remaining Patrick men, he found his own purpose. A small light in the fog, heartily reduced. Peasants, slaves and veteran men. The roughest sorts. The sorts that should have been cast off and shamed. The eccentrics among them in Firyr, and even in Verdant and Blackthorn – they'd had that done. They'd found their stagnation for all those years, in the same way that Oliver had. They knew not a path for themselves to shine as brightly as they ought to. Yet under Patrick command, they found that ability of flight, and they found it even more recently.

Oliver slowed down Nelson, and he stopped in front of them. They were the reminder of what he was, even for all that fog. That fierce passion in their eyes, that burning loyalty, that love. The willingness to not only die for their Lord, but to fight with every bit of strength that they had, to go all that distance, and to willingly, every single time, charge after him into the heart of the chaos.

Fifteen thousand men Oliver had under his command, but it was only those two thousand Patrick men that were truly his, and so he spoke to them, for he knew them, and for the others, he had difficulty finding words.

"Comrades of mine," Oliver said. "We find ourselves, once more, difficulty placed, I fear. I give you my apologies."

"Difficulty placed, Lord Patrick?" Firyr shouted back. "Yer mean to say, you expect some hard fighting, eh?"

"Hard fighting," Oliver agreed. "But I know not yet against what, Captain Firyr. Perhaps I will require more from you than even against the Emersons. Even after two grand victories you have already achieved – I might be forced to ask for a third from you, as tired as you are."

"You don't need to ask us, General," Jorah said. "We do so willingly."

"That's right," Firyr said. "If you're throwing us into another bloody pit of fire, yer a bit of a bastard for doing so, General – but I reckons you've forgotten what it is that we are. Once in the fire, that's an accident, ain't it? Twice in the fire? Well – that's no coincidence, is it?"

"It's not," Jorah agreed.

"Twice in the fire, that means that's where we ought to be," Kaya said. "We'll do it three times, General. Fish swim in the river, and we Patrick men walk through fire."

"They have the right of it, my Lord," Verdant said, from by Oliver's side. "We would not be Patrick men, if this was not where we stood. Here in this fog, with uncertainty looming before us. Whatever mighty beast of an army we might face, the Sword of the Patrick House will be enough to cleave through it. For we are your sword, my Lord. Your army stands as your weapon, eager to slice through your foes."

Oliver listened, as his men, one after the other, seemed to find their resolve – and they did it quickly. They did not flounder around in the darkness for it, as now Oliver found himself doing. They had it straight away. It was there, as a burning faith, as an absolute belief, that no matter what enemy it was that General Patrick had them face, he would be able to guide them through.