Valkyrie's Shadow

Before the Storm: Act 1, Chapter 1

Before the Storm: Act 1, Chapter 1

Chapter 1

12th Day, Lower Wind Month, 1 CE

Arrays of magical lighting cast a soft glow that glinted off of armour polished to a mirror sheen. In the highest hall of Arwintar, the First Division of the Imperial Army’s Second Army Group stood resplendent, row by perfect row. Every soldier faced forward, tilting their heads up slightly to the dais where Jircniv Rune Farlord El-Nix, Lord Protector Paramount of the Baharuth Empire, was seated upon his golden throne.

Standing to either side of the throne were two of the Great Imperial Knights, Count Palatine Baziwood Peshmel and Count Palatine Nimble Arc Dale Anoch. Immediately below the dais to the Emperor’s left were the members of the Imperial Court Council; to his right were the heads of the Imperial Army. A man in the full livery of an Imperial Herald stood at the end of a long carpet leading to the throne’s base, a large scroll unfurled in his hands.

“Captain Willhem Ernst Dale Germund!”

“Hah!”

With a sharp affirmative, Captain Germund stepped out from his place in the front right corner of the First Division’s Fifth Company. The sound of his boots over the gold-veined floor of black marble echoed off of the vaulted architecture of the Imperial Palace. From the galleries above, the eyes of the Imperial Nobility scrutinised his every movement as he presented himself before the Emperor.

“Willhem Ernst Dale Germund,” the herald’s voice rang throughout the hall, “for your valiant service in the Blister Campaign, you are to be raised by one rank in the peerage and granted the territory of Hohengrünwald. Additionally, you will be granted two hundred units of gold and five units of treasure.”

The Emperor grasped a scroll placed atop the silver plate beside the throne and stepped forward. Captain Germund went to a knee and raised both hands while lowering his head. The Emperor placed the scroll in his hands.

“Continue to serve long and well, Captain Germund,” he said.

“By the will of Your Imperial Majesty!” Captain Germund replied.

The Captain rose and offered a crisp salute. Light applause filtered from above. Normally, an award like that was rare, but land and treasure were being given away left and right in the wake of the Second Army Group’s campaign in the Blister. The vast swathe of land had been divided into so many territories that the Court Council had given up trying to give them unique and imaginative names.

Not that the recipients were unappreciative. They were quite pleased, in fact. It was infinitely better than serving for a decade and having to compete over a handful of titles slowly carved out over the years. Conquering the domain of an Ancient Dragon had turned out to be quite the lucrative venture.

“Mage Officer Rangobart Eck Waraiya Roberbad.”

Eh?

The slightest of frowns turned Rangobart’s lips as he responded to his name being called. It wasn’t that he didn’t expect anything: it was just that he had been called out of order. His company had a handful of officers and he was the lowest-ranked.

Rangobart became painfully sensitive to the gazes of the attendees. There was no doubt they had noticed, as well. He could almost imagine the tendrils of speculation and scheming sprouting all around him.

Countless hushed whispers combined to create the rasp of an unsettling wind, breaking him out of worried thoughts. He found himself already standing before the Emperor, and beside the Emperor’s arm was a disturbing sight that nearly shattered his mask of aristocratic composure. The expected scroll was there, but beside it was an ornate dagger resting on a blue velvet pillow.

Oh, shit.

He glanced at the Imperial Herald, who still hadn’t started speaking. It was undoubtedly on purpose. He had been wrangled into some sort of show and he had no idea what it was about. Rangobart’s eyes shifted back to the Emperor, whose amethyst eyes glittered in an odd mix of amusement and pity.

“Rangobart Eck Waraiya Roberbad,” the herald finally spoke, “for your valiant service in the Blister Campaign, you are to be raised by one rank in the peerage. Additionally, you will be granted one hundred units of gold and two units of treasure.”

Rising one rank in the peerage meant that he had gone from an honorary Knight to a landed Knight, which was expected. The amount of gold and treasure was identical to everyone else who received the same promotion. It was enough to begin developing his new land with…except that the herald hadn’t mentioned any territories being granted to him.

He kept glancing at the ceremonial dagger, wondering what ludicrous charge awaited him. The Emperor rose, taking the scroll and blade in hand. The herald continued.

“You are also hereby promoted to Mage Captain and will be raised by an additional four ranks in the peerage. With this will come the territories of Kolberg, Österhalden, and Brennenthal.”

A Mage Captain? And did they just give me a damn mountain?

No such rank existed in the Imperial Army, but the Imperial Army’s structure was predictable enough to know where things were going. To his surprise, however, it was not the Imperial Herald who delivered the finishing blow.

“Captain Roberbad.”

Rangobart genuflected before the Emperor.

“Your Imperial Majesty?”

“As the first true Mage Captain of the Baharuth Empire, you are charged with a crucial task: the creation of the first operational War Wizard Company of the Imperial Army. To aid you in this great venture, you have been reassigned to the Sixth Army Group and are now also a member of the Imperial Ministry of Magic’s War Magic Branch. We expect great things from you, Captain Roberbad.”

A long pause shrouded the entire audience chamber in stillness as the ceremony’s attendees digested the Emperor’s words. Then, the silence was broken by a single, familiar voice.

“Get fucked, Rangobart!” Harlow called.

The members of the Court Council and most of the Nobles in the galleries recoiled in affronted disgust at the Sergeant’s crass interjection. The Imperial Army’s leadership and the entire First Division of the Second Army Group, however, burst into laughter. The Emperor, too, seemed to be silently laughing with them.

Someone had just dumped several lifetimes’ worth of work on his shoulders. Rangobart was pretty sure he knew who it was.

“By the will of Your Imperial Majesty,” he sighed.

“Oh, I’m so proud of you, Rangobart!”

After the ceremony, Rangobart endured a tearful hug from his mother below the steps to the palace entrance. He wasn’t the only one going through the experience – the mothers and sisters of other soldiers did the same while their fathers proudly clapped their sons on the back. They were all commoners, though. Those of Noble lineage celebrated in what they considered a more dignified manner, though since they were almost entirely all members of the martial nobility, it didn’t look like much at all. In fact, they were simply leaving without a word.

“I just wish you’d have worn armour like all the other Imperial Knights,” his mother went on. “You would have looked so gallant…”

“War Wizards wear robes for official ceremonies, Mother.”

For that, he was copiously thankful. It took weeks to conduct the award ceremony for the entire First Division – they got through a company a day – and he could only pity the Imperial Knights who had to wear plate armour through all of that. Then again, they probably thought nothing of it.

“Where’s everyone else?” Rangobart asked.

“Oh, you know your father. He’s nobling with the other Nobles. Your brother is with him as well and Lorelei won’t ever let me be seen at your father’s side.”

“I see.”

He supposed that was to be expected. His father’s wife would never allow Rangobart’s mother to be seen together with her husband in public, even on an occasion like this. Thinking about it was awkward: Count Roberbad would be happily leveraging Rangobart’s achievements and his wife would have to smile through her husband boasting about the son he fathered through his concubine while his trueborn son – Lorelei’s – stood around listening to it all.

Rangobart had no wish to see the result of that equation, so he took his mother’s arm and led her away from the palace entrance.

“How did you like the Imperial Palace, Mother?” He asked.

“It was more wondrous than I ever imagined it would be,” she gushed. “There must have been thousands of Nobles in the galleries! But there’s one thing I couldn’t understand.”

“What’s that?”

“Everyone around me seemed angry. Why is that?”

“Ah…”

Her mother wasn’t a Noble, so she wasn’t educated in the intricacies of the court. Additionally, though Rangobart loved her very much, she was a tad slow in the head. She had become Count Roberbad’s concubine purely through her looks, and, since Nobles lived in a world where beautiful people abounded, it meant that she was extraordinarily beautiful for a commoner.

She was still relatively young, as well, having had Rangobart when she was fourteen. For better or worse, this meant that Rangobart’s father still showed her his favour. She lived a life relatively free of worries but was also a thorn in the side of Countess Roberbad.

Rangobart wasn’t sure how long that would last after his unexpected promotion. His father might be taking advantage of his son’s achievements for now, but Rangobart wasn’t sure at what point he would start viewing that son as a threat. It was almost certain that the Countess would make her move at that point and chase Rangobart’s mother out of the household once and for all.

“It’s because the Emperor is from a martial house,” he finally settled on an answer. “The regular Nobles are jealous of that relationship.”

His mother nodded slowly at his words. It was probably simple enough for her to get the gist of things and it technically wasn’t wrong.

In addition to the traditional relationship between the Imperial Dynasty and Baharuth’s martial aristocracy, the Imperial Army was the Emperor’s main pillar of support both during the events through which he seized the throne and throughout his highly successful reign. The award ceremonies held for the Imperial Army not only reaffirmed that connection, but also served to ensure that the loyalty of the Imperial Army was the Emperor’s alone.

The long parade of award ceremonies in recent times was especially chafing to the civilian Nobles. They were forced to watch as thousands of titles and phenomenal amounts of wealth were handed to their martial counterparts, further strengthening the martial aristocracy with the promotion of every new Imperial Knight. It was already at the point where all the scheming in the world couldn’t save the civilian Nobles from being trampled under the Imperial Knights’ hooves.

Thus, the power of Emperor Jircniv had become nigh absolute. General Kabein and his Commanders postulated that this was the ultimate objective of the Sorcerous Kingdom’s orders to subjugate the Blister and push into the southern frontier. A de facto absolute ruler could carry out the mandates of their new overlord much more easily, after all. If one assumed that someone could mastermind the moves in the Empire to achieve such far-reaching results, however, one could never truly know if that was the full extent of their schemes.

“Is there something in particular that you’d like for dinner, Mother?” Rangobart asked.

“Everywhere you’ve taken me these past few weeks have been wonderful, dear,” his mother answered. “I’ll happily go wherever you choose. I’m curious about that reward, though. One hundred gold coins doesn’t seem appropriate for slaying a Dragon.”

“One hundred units of gold is not one hundred gold coins, Mother,” Rangobart replied. “It’s…well, let’s go and take a look, shall we?”

They made their way to the Imperial Treasury, which wasn’t far from the main palace complex. A small queue of Imperial Knights from the Second Army Group’s First Division – pretty much entirely consisting of the commoner stock that had just been granted honorary knighthoods – stood outside the door. Some were with family, though not many parents and siblings could stray so far from home with tenancies and work to manage.

Rangobart joined the end of the line, where he found Harlow standing alone with his hands in his pockets. Somehow, he had found the time to change out of his armour into a semi-formal outfit.

“Well,” Harlow said, “if it isn’t the Lord Mage Captain Viscount. Already pick out a wife?”

“Oh, you,” Rangobart’s mother tittered.

“She’s my mother,” Rangobart told the leering Sergeant.

“Your mo–” Harlow’s mouth snapped shut for a moment, “Damn it all. Wanna trade?”

“No.”

Harlow was over ten years Rangobart’s senior, which made the Sergeant close to his mother in age. He could imagine what a ‘trade’ entailed…not that he wanted to imagine it.

“Who is this gentleman, Rangobart?”

“Ah, my apologies,” Rangobart straightened. “Mother, this is Sergeant Harlow, one of the squad leaders in my company. Harlow, my mother, Freidlin.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Sir Harlow.”

“Oh, no, the pleasure’s all mine, I assure you.”

Rangobart considered lighting the man on fire right then and there. Surely he would be forgiven for it, considering the circumstances.

“Why are you lined up here, anyway?” Rangobart asked, “Don’t tell me you plan to drink all of your prizes away.”

“Unlike you,” Harlow answered, “my ass isn’t made out of gold. And I ain’t drinking it all away: I need money to buy stuff from the market. Arwintar’s got all the things. I figured I’d fix up my tent all nice and cosy like Zahradnik’s. I thought winter patrols were bad, but those jungle patrols are a whole new level of hell.”

“What about your new title?” Rangobart asked.

“What about it?”

He gave Harlow a sour look. Imperial Knights were notoriously bad with money and it seemed that Harlow was no exception.

“You’re landed gentry now, ‘Sir Harlow’,” Rangobart told him. “You don’t get an honorary knight’s salary anymore. Your fief is your income and all the land they’ve been giving out is in that ‘new level of hell’ that you’ve discovered.”

“But I get a seneschal from the Imperial Administration to handle that, right?”

“You do, but you still need resources to develop your land. Money. Also, you’re paying that seneschal a salary.”

“…fuck.”

The jump from a Third-class Imperial Knight to a Second-class Imperial Knight was a jarring one for the vast majority of the Imperial Army, which was mostly recruited from common stock. In almost every case, the Knights who had grown accustomed to having a generous salary saw a drastic drop in their standard of living due to the costs of developing their new titles. Of course, having a title meant having revenues for life so long as they were well-managed, which the seneschals dispatched by the Imperial Administration were well-equipped to do.

It was quite the clever scheme on the part of the Imperial Administration. Land was commonly seen as wealth, but one had to make that land work to see any revenues from it. This created a dependency on the Imperial Administration, plus the newly minted Second-class Imperial Knights were driven to perform to earn more honours to get out of the trap they had fallen into. Since those Knights were never at risk of being impoverished due to the work of their seneschals, they took it as a challenge or goal rather than a hardship.

“Hey, Lord Mage Captain Viscount.”

“What? And stop calling me that.”

“Lend me some money.”

“No!”

“Oh, come on! You got three territories!”

“And did you hear the names of those territories? It’s a mountain, the mountainside, and a valley below the mountain that sounds like it’s on fire. And it’s all in the Blister. I bet my Lord Father would bankrupt the house trying to develop even a quarter of it.”

He wouldn’t fall victim to the same pitfall that the commoners did, so the Emperor had just shoved him into it and laughed along with everyone else. A vague sense of dread accompanied Rangobart when he thought about finally learning the details of his new title and position. One got by on their merits in the Baharuth Empire and some sick, twisted fellow had decided that this also meant that merit could be induced.

“Sure,” Harlow said, “but what does that have to do with me?”

Rangobart pointed a finger at Harlow. Harlow dove into a nearby hedge. He didn’t reappear.

“Is what you talked about going to be trouble?” Rangobart’s mother asked worriedly.

“It’s nothing to worry about, Mother,” Rangobart answered. “I’ll figure something out.”

His mother’s good humour returned. When it came their turn at the front desk, Rangobart placed his scroll on the counter.

“Shall we have everything delivered to your principal residence, Captain?” The clerk asked.

“Yes, please,” Rangobart answered. “May I review the delivery?”

“Of course. This way, Sir.”

They were led into a side office where they bid to wait. Several minutes later, five trolleys were rolled into the room by the treasury staff. The clerk came in behind them, cradling a chest in both arms.

“I believe you were interested in these?” The clerk said.

“Yes, thank you,” Rangobart replied.

He hadn’t been, but now that the chest was in front of him, he was curious what the ‘treasures’ were. The clerk had probably made the assumption since most Imperial Knights knew what a unit of gold was.

Once the staff left Rangobart to his inspection, his mother came around the table to gape at the gold units.

“It would have been easier if they had put this all on one trolley…”

“They’re gold ingots, Mother. The trolleys would collapse under the weight if they were loaded with any more than what you see.”

Rather than trying to deal with all of the different coinage that the Imperial Army came across, it was all melted down into ‘gold units’ and redistributed as part of the rewards and honours system. In the case of the Viridian Dragon Lord’s hoard, it also prevented a sudden influx of coins from wreaking havoc with the Empire’s economy. The Empire, of course, kept its share of the loot and they were bound to use it to fund a vast array of government projects.

Rangobart lifted the lid of his ‘treasure chest’, revealing a pair of items carefully laid on a silk-clad cushion. A ‘unit of treasure’ was an item that fell within a set range of value that could qualify as an heirloom or display piece in a Noble’s gallery. In Rangobart’s case, he had been awarded a rod and a necklace, which he graced with a long frown.

Just how far do they have to stick their noses into my business?

The rod was fashioned from a creamy, iridescent material and capped with a black pearl the size of his fist. He stretched his hand over the item.

“?Appraisal Magic Item?.”

Huh, looks like the rod itself is fashioned from pearl, too. It’s magic, but nothing unknown. Well, the Ministry of Magic would have taken it for study, if so.

Rangobart inspected the necklace, but it was entirely mundane despite its exquisite appearance. He balefully eyed the rubies dripping off of the intricate silver chain. The treasures awarded to him were obnoxiously clear in their meaning.

The rod was the work of the Imperial Army, meant to serve as the symbol of his new position as a Mage Captain. He would have preferred it if they had given him something less gaudy, even if it meant that it wasn’t worth as much.

The ruby necklace, on the other hand, was the Court Council telling him to go find a wife or at least someone with whom to sire heirs to his new title. With his reassignment to the Sixth Army Group, he supposed it was a practical consideration in addition to being a matter of the establishment’s expectations.

Too nosy by far. Hmm…

He knew that the Court Council was right, but he possessed little desire to go looking for a wife. Especially considering the recent episode that his father had put him through.

“Mother,” Rangobart held up the necklace between his hands, “what do you think?”

His mother gasped and came over.

“It’s beautiful!”

“Then it’s yours.”

“Truly?” She looked up at him, wide-eyed.

“Truly. It’s the least I can do for you as your son.”

Tears welled up in her mother’s sapphire-blue eyes.

“Oh, Rangobart, you’re such a dear. I haven’t received anything like this in ages…”

His mother turned around and lifted her hair to expose her nape. A troubled expression haunted Rangobart’s face as he helped her put on his gift. He had been away from home for so long that he had fallen out of touch with the affairs of House Roberbad. It seemed that his mother’s time in the household would be ending sooner than he thought.

The next morning, before the award ceremony continued, Rangobart went to the Imperial Army Complex to report in to the Sixth Army Group’s Headquarters. As the rumours suggested, it was busier than ever and officers rushed from building to building on one errand or the other. Upon speaking to the officer at the main office’s front desk, he was sent straight to the top floor of the building. There, he found the all-too-familiar figure of General Ray, who looked almost exactly as the most recent deluge of propaganda posters portrayed him.

Rangobart strode up to the General’s desk and offered a crisp salute.

“Mage Off–Captain Roberbad, reporting in, Sir.”

The General looked up from his paperwork with a raised eyebrow.

“You’re not due to report in for a while yet, Captain Roberbad.”

“Yes, Sir. I just thought I’d come in to see what this was all about.”

“Is that so? Well, I suppose the Emperor did keep things vague. His Imperial Majesty just loves toying around with the nobility like that.”

General Ray leaned to the side, retrieving a binder from a shelf along the wall. It landed on the desk between them with a thud that shook the stone floor.

“Your assignment.”

Rangobart tested the weight of the imposing object before picking it up and leafing through its contents. He didn’t even need to see any names to confirm his suspicions about who was responsible for his promotion: her telltale manner was all over the magic-related portions of the assignment.

“Sir,” he said, “have you ever thought that enemies from the Academy might plague you for your entire career?”

“I don’t see why that wouldn’t be the case,” General Ray replied. “It’s one of the intended outcomes of the institution, after all. In your case, however, I figured you had a friend in high places, not an enemy.”

“Yes, well, I suppose it’s just like her to make it seem that way.”

“Either way, this is your duty to carry out. Can you do it, or not?”

“I can’t promise that it will be as pretty as this trebuchet round describes, Sir.”

General Ray snorted.

“That’s how it always is,” he told him. “Everything’s made to appeal to the bureaucracy. The people in the field just have to deal with all of the troublesome details that they gloss over.”

“In that case,” Rangobart said, “it can be accomplished, eventually. Even then, however, it’s something that must continually evolve to keep up with the times.”

“I’m glad to see your head’s already in the right place, Roberbad,” the General nodded. “I hope you can survive what’s coming.”

“May I ask what’s coming, sir?”

The General leaned back in his stiff wooden seat, enclosing Rangobart within his measuring gaze.

“It’s almost over, Roberbad. The generations-long process of imperial reform. The Empire is ready to become a true empire.”

“What does the Sorcerous Kingdom have to say about that?”

General Ray shrugged.

“As far as I can tell, they’ve been expediting things. Testing us. Profiling our character as a nation. I read the reports on the Blister Campaign and I saw that you were attached to Zahradnik. Do you understand what she was doing?”

“That’s…no, Sir. Not in the way that you appear to be asking about. I only got bits and pieces.”

“I see. Well, you’ll get a lot more of those bits and pieces once you formally begin your duties with the Sixth Army Group. Before that time comes, I strongly recommend that you get all of your affairs in order.”