A horse whimpered somewhere in the ranks behind him, and Basil’s own mount gave a sharp, wet snort as if to agree with the tension in the air.

His father had decided that a squadron of honor, was the appropriate way to receive their illustrious ally, which in reality meant dragging a few dozen knights of the princely guard away from their pissing-about to sit around in the mid-heat or mid-cold, which depended only on how the day felt. Basil wasn’t entirely sure what kind of insult a grown Prince was supposed to take from being welcomed by a Prince’s son, but in the world of his father and Lucius, a misplaced sneeze could apparently start a war with the man.

Provided he was told just how easy it was to make a civil one in Kakunian’s backyward.

Still, the weight of the task was already making his neck stiff, and the company wasn’t helping. Basil hadn’t asked for Ser Rodry Longspear, just as he hadn’t asked for the dozens of other armored shadows looming behind him. But most of all he hadn’t asked for Rodry.

Whatever relief he’d felt at being given a "man’s job" had soured like milk left in the midday sun the moment the knight had pulled up beside him.

Rodry was a sniffer on that particular day. Gods curse him for that, he sniffed a damn lot. 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

Every few seconds, a wet, rhythmic inhale broke the silence, more grating than the sound of a saw on bone. Basil tried to stare straight ahead at the horizon, but after the tenth sniff, his self-control snapped.

"Perhaps Ser Sausage-Sniffer would like to return to his lodgings?" Basil muttered, not turning his head. "We wouldn’t want my father’s dearest ally to drop dead from a common cold the moment he sees us. Though I grant you, it would make for a hilarious ending to the chronicle."

"I wouldn’t..." Rodry paused for a particularly wet intake through his nose "...think of doing that. Your father tasked me with your protection."

"I highly doubt Merelao is going to spear me during a greeting."

"All the same. I was tasked."

Sniff.

Basil closed his eyes for a moment, praying to the Weaver for a shred of patience. He was trying his absolute best not to muck this up, but the Kakunians hadn’t even arrived and he was already wroth enough to kick someone.

As if the gods had finally decided to answer a prayer, the first banners began to rise over the crest of the road. It was a forest of silk and spear-tips, far more than he had expected. He’d been told Merelao was leading four hundred of his own men, armored and equipped by Yarzat’s own smiths, but the dust cloud currently choking the sky suggested the Rebel lord had been busy recruiting.

Lucius had said of that in the meeting, but he hadn’t thought to see so many from a man that a month’s ago everyone thought would go to the grave.

From where Basil sat, he’d wager there were at least a thousand men making a mess of that road. They emerged from the edge of the great green forest where Basil had spent the last month playing at war, while his father waged it.

If one were to turn East and ride for a few hours, the grey silhouette of the Bastion would eventually cut into the sky, but here, the scenery was much bleaker.

Edric had told him stories of how the League had sent scouting parties into these woods, only for the trees to "swallow" them, a polite way of saying the Ardita had butchered them in the bushes.

When the invaders finally realized they couldn’t win a fight under the canopy, they had tried to burn the forest down. Luckily, the gods had seen fit to drown the South in rain for three weeks straight, keeping the fire from consuming everything.

Still, the damage was there. As the Kakunian host marched closer, they passed through sections of blackened and leafless tusks, the charred remains of ancient oaks that stood like grave markers.

To pass the time, Basil started counting the banners. Squinting against the glare of the sun.

One...two...

He tallied thirteen of them. He didn’t recognize a single one except the royal, which even then was strange; his tutors had drilled him on the great houses of Yarzat and the royal lineages of the principalities, but Kakunian heraldry hadn’t made the syllabus. No doubt he’d be catching up on those lessons soon enough.

"Unfortunate, isn’t it, Ser?" Basil muttered, glancing over at Longspear. "I see no nuns in the vanguard. Can that apt nose of yours pick up anything? You seem to have caught a scent."

That actually managed to put some color in the knight’s cheeks. "I’d beg the little prince to keep his voice down," Rodry grumbled.

"You’re hard of hearing, Ser. Perhaps if you fell back to the rear where I couldn’t hear you sniffing like a wet hound, we’d both get what we want."

"Your father task—"

"For the love of the Gods, just try your best not to sniff in front of the Kakunians," Basil whispered sharply. "It’s embarrassing enough that we have to coddle them like children."

"I am sure your dashing presence will be the peak of their journey."

As much as Basil detested the man, the knight wasn’t lying about the clothes. Basil was dressed to the nines: double-woven blue wool with a black falcon emblazoned across the chest, and long, flowing silk sleeves that danced in the wind. All of it was draped in a heavy cloak of red silk. If he were a cake, he’d probably take a bite out of himself.

"I sometimes weep that my father didn’t let that troublesome priest have his way with you," Basil muttered, but Rodry remained glued to his side.

"Lies, my dear princeling," Ser Rodry replied smoothly. "That priest was a fountain of falsehoods. Me, a heretic? You could overturn every stone in the province and not find a man more pious than I."

"Indeed. Who else but a most pious man would convince half the nuns in the capital to wear holy stars under their skirts? I hear whenever you pass, they open their legs to aid you in prayer."

"Many would agree such things should be made tradition,"

"I’m sure they’ll all wear black the day you die. ’’

’’It will be long before that, I fear’’

’’A shame about the candles, then’’

"Candles?My small Prince?"

"All the ones I’ve lit praying for your demise going to waste."

With that, Basil dug his heels into his horse’s flanks, charging down the road. The mass of knights his father had sent as an escort gawked for a heartbeat before realization set in, and the entire iron-clad company thundered after the heir of Yarzat through the mud.

As Basil drew closer, the legendary Kakunian host began to lose some of its luster. After all the tales of their triumph over the royal army, he had expected a wall of shimmering steel; instead, the reality was a bit more... varied.

The vanguard was respectable enough. About half a hundred knights sat tall in their saddles, their armor catching the light, some even boasted full suits of plate, a rare and expensive sight. It seemed Lucius hadn’t been exaggerating when he mentioned that Merelao had a knack for attracting wandering hedge knights looking for a cause to bleed under. If these were the men who had broken the royal lines at Ricorum, they at least looked the part.

But as the road dipped and rose, giving Basil a vantage point over the deeper ranks, the army began to look more like a desperate migration.

Directly behind the horsemen marched the heavy foot, soldiers clearly outfitted with his father’s Yarzat steel, sturdy breastplates that stood out like polished jewels against the drabness of the rest.

Beyond them, however, the quality plummeted. The axes and maces of the front gave way to simple, notched spears and bucklers that looked like they’d seen better decades. He spotted a few clusters of men clutching hunting bows.

Basil felt a flicker of snobbery before checking himself.

He had spent too much time staring at the disciplined, uniform blocks of the Yarzat Legions, where every man was a mirror of the next. His father’s own lords often brought levies that looked just as ragged, held together only by a shared banner and a fear of the lash or greed for loot. These Kakunians weren’t professional soldiers; they were men who had traded their plows for spears and actually managed to win.

There was some dignity in that, even if their boots were falling apart.

Seeing the Yarzat party trotting down the road to meet them, the Kakunian vanguard picked up their pace. The rhythmic thud of hooves on the muddy track accelerated, a thousand men and horses closing the gap for the meeting.

Basil pulled back on the reins, his horse huffing as he slowed to a dignified walk. He didn’t want to arrive covered in mud, no matter how dashing his red silk cloak looked in the wind. Behind him, he heard the heavy clatter of Ser Rodry and the rest of his guard finally catching up, their breath ragged as they formed a protective semi-circle around their young Prince.