Chapter 713: Restrained War
"Why? Why would you do such a thing to your own people?"
Tiernan’s accusation hung in the air like a sword ready to fall, and the burly man struggled to remain seated as he considered the meaning behind Ashlynn’s words. He’d heard several times how Lothian March was different from Blackwell County. The rolling foothills in the shadow of the great mountains in the west didn’t have the benefit of Blackwell Harbor and the ability to send out fleets for supplies if a harvest was lean or storms damaged their mills and granaries.
In Lothian March, the autumn harvest was about building up supplies to sustain families through the harshness of winter. Some hamlets in Dunn Barony and even entire villages closer to Lothian City could become completely cut off from the outside world once the snows started to fall in earnest.
These last few weeks of autumn represented a vital time for villagers to sell what excess harvest they had in exchange for the things they couldn’t grow on their own. Losing a caravan now could leave a family destitute over the winter, and losing herds of livestock could mean empty bellies, not just for the families that raised the livestock but for the people in the towns and cities who would have purchased them to last through the winter.
Prices for everything would go up, and fear of additional raids would make people in the farming villages less likely to sell their own surplus on the next market day. Depending on how large these raids were, the effects could be felt throughout the entire march!
"How many?" Tiernan said slowly. "How many raids?" he asked, unable to stop himself as the need to understand what Ashlynn had done overwhelmed him. If it was something small, if it had been necessary for some reason he didn’t yet understand...
"A little over a dozen on the first night," Ashlynn said, cutting through Tiernan’s attempts to manufacture excuses to justify Ashlynn’s actions like a hot knife burning his thoughts away as she severed the notion that she wasn’t harming many people.
"Why?" Isabell asked, setting her cup of tea down on the small table next to her chair. "Why these raids? Why now?"
Tiernan’s face started to grow red when he turned to look at the gray-haired engineer, sitting patiently behind her silver-rimmed spectacles as though she were a tutor, giving Lady Ashlynn an exam.
For a moment, he wanted to shout at her, to ask her what reason could possibly justify attacking so many commoners, but when he saw the focused, evaluating look in her steely-gray eyes he choked down the hot words that wanted to spill from his lips and made himself listen to Lady Ashlynn’s answers.