Morning Star arrived like everything else in this "war" -- quietly, without acknowledgment, another day laid over the last until the differences between them became theoretical. The cold did not care that the year had changed; the stones of Fort Amol held the night’s frost just as stubbornly, the broken wall leaned at the same precarious angle, and the men woke with the same slow reluctance, breath fogging as they stepped into a world that had not improved while they slept.

 

1 Morning Star, 202. A meaningless boundary.

 

Marcus stood in the bailey and watched the fort settle into motion -- water drawn, fires coaxed back to life, the low murmur of men easing into the day -- and failed once again to forget. 

 

Five days since the travelers had come and gone; five days since Melissa Shae had stood in front of him and, with quiet certainty, severed something foundational within him. She had carved herself out of the center of his soul with the precision of her blade, leaving a festering wound that would never close.

 

With nothing to alleviate his futile looping thoughts, he distracted himself in the only way available: he worked. As he had for the previous four days, from the moment he woke (well, from the moment he finished his daily drilling, which he now clung to even harder as the only thing left of his connection to his mother -- his real one, left behind on some other Skyrim), he threw himself into whatever work was there, from wall bracing to cooking to cleaning. Small things, contained things -- problems that responded to effort and did not ask questions he could not answer. It was enough, for a while, to keep his thoughts from circling too close to places he did not wish to tread.

 

The courier arrived at midday, horse lathered, cloak crusted with frost. He was young -- barely out of his teens -- with the pinched look of someone who had been riding too long on too little sleep. He handed over a sealed dispatch, accepted a bowl of stew without a word, and collapsed in a corner of the longhouse before anyone thought to ask him questions. Marcus broke the seal standing in the yard as the cold ate into the fingers through his gloves and scanned the document:

 

STORMCLOAK FIELD COMMAND

WINDHELM OPERATIONS OFFICE

----------------------------------------

FIELD REQUEST FORM – RESPONSE

----------------------------------------

Requesting Unit:        Fort Amol

Acting Commander:       Tatter

Request Type:           Morale Support Allocation (Rotation Inclusion)

Date Submitted:  21 Evening Star, 4E 201

----------------------------------------

REQUEST SUMMARY:

Petition to include Fort Amol in the established

camp follower rotation, citing extended isolation,

declining morale, and increased risk of

disciplinary incidents among stationed troops.

----------------------------------------

COMMAND REVIEW:

Reviewed by:            Dragonstomper

Rank/Title:             Field Commander, Stormcloak Forces

Location:               Windhelm

----------------------------------------

DISPOSITION:

DENIED

----------------------------------------

REMARKS:

The rotation is locked until the next review.

Submit again in six months.

Maintain current discipline.

----------------------------------------

AUTHORIZED SIGNATURE:

Dragonstomper

Field Commander, Stormcloak Forces

Windhelm

----------------------------------------

 

“About time,” Bent muttered as he approached. “I was beginning to think Windhelm forgot us. What is it?”

 

Marcus handed him the message without comment and watched over the wall at nothing as he listened to Bent’s under-the-breath cursing, then took the message back when Bent was done.

 

“Of course. This is not going to go over well.”

 

“Especially since we’re not going to tell them.”

 

Bent lifted his eyebrows. “No?” Then: “Maybe that is for the best. But they’re going to suspect.”

 

“I know.” Marcus sighed and turned back toward the fort. “We’ll need to think of something before rumors begin to grow.”

 

In that, at least, Marcus felt fortunate, because a different rumor popped up that overrode even the pulsing group libido.

 

The fort had heard about the courier in those few minutes Marcus and Bent were reading (news traveled faster than men in a place this small) but the courier had brought more than sealed orders -- he had brought talk: she-devil sightings. Multiple. Everywhere. A farmer near Ivarstead reported a woman matching her description passing through at dawn. A patrol in the Pale claimed they had seen a flash of light on a ridgeline east of Dawnstar. Someone in Riften swore she had walked right through the marketplace in broad daylight and vanished into the Ratway. A merchant caravan said she had stopped them on the road near Rorikstead, asked for water, then disappeared into the trees.

 

None of it matched. None of it made sense. But every man at Fort Amol had been at Whiterun. They had all seen her -- the figure on the wall, the impossible speed, the even more impossible deflections of catapult stones that turned back and broke the army. That was real; that was burned into them. And now she was everywhere at once, a ghost multiplying across every rumor that carried her name. It was all the camp could talk about the entire day, for which Marcus was grateful.

 

Later that evening, as the fire burned low and the men not on watch had drifted off in twos and threes, their bedrolls waiting, their voices fading into the dark, Marcus sat and stared at the coals as the rejection burned in his pocket while she-devil rumors still circled in his skull. Bent settled beside him without being asked, dropping onto the log with a grunt. He stretched his legs out, crossed his ankles, and said nothing for a long moment.

 

"You're thinking loud," Bent said finally.

 

Marcus grunted.

 

The fire popped. A coal broke free and died on the cold ground. Marcus watched it go dark as Bent added, "The men are restless."

 

"I know."

 

"Hundred men, nothing to do, nowhere to go. Balls swollen large enough to use in catapults. Speaking of, Whiterun's still in their heads. They need to move -- staring at the same walls every day is going to curdle them."

 

“I know.” Marcus turned the dispatch over in his hands, then threw it into the fire. “If command won’t give us what we need, we’ll have to find a way to do it ourselves.”

 

Bent snorted. “Not too many whores out here in the boonies.”

 

“It is, indeed, a whore-free area.” Marcus sighed, then lifted his head as a thought trickled into his mind. “You know," he said slowly, "the she-devil rumors..."

 

Bent raised an eyebrow.

 

"They're everywhere. Ivarstead. Rorikstead. The Pale. Someone should investigate. Properly. Small teams, staggered departures, cover more ground that way."

 

Bent nodded after a moment. “I see what you’re saying. Give them something to do."

 

“Yes. An outlet for this pent up energy. Probably nothing to any of them, but…"

 

“But that doesn’t matter.”

 

“No it does not. In fact, it would be much better if they did not run into that monster.”

 

Bent nodded slowly, the motion carrying more weight than a simple nod should hold. "And if their route happens to pass through a town with an inn and a warm fire and women who don't mind a soldier's company for a few coins -- well, that's just the natural shape of the road, isn't it?"

 

Marcus felt something in his chest loosen, a thread he had not realized he was holding. "I'll draw up the patrol routes tonight. Split them into teams of six. Stagger departures so half the garrison isn't gone at once."

 

"Take a week or two, depending on how deep they go."

 

"Should give them time to find themselves again."

 

Bent clapped Marcus on the shoulder then stood, brushed off his hands, and looked down with an expression that was hard to read in the dying light. "First day of the new year. Maybe this one will be better."

 

He walked away, leaving Marcus alone to chew on his own bitter thoughts.

 

 

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