Chapter 714: Why Us?
"I think you’re being very restrained," Isabell said, reaching out to set a hand gently on Master Tiernan’s forearm. She shook her head slightly at the muscular ironmonger before turning her full attention back to Ashlynn. "At least, so far. But how long will your restraint last now that your army has tasted blood? You said they’re hungry for vengeance of their own. Will they really be content to raid livestock and caravans?"
"Of course they won’t," Ashlynn said, accepting Isabell’s point without attempting to counter it. "Though it isn’t as bad as you might think, at least for now. Commander Tausau’s Third Army draws heavily from irregular warriors recruited from across the mountains. While they all have their own reasons for joining the fight, the woodsmen and hunters who are native to the Vale of Mists and the Outlying Villages are in the minority among his soldiers."
The early reports might not have mentioned it, but Ashlynn was certain that another reason for the heavy losses suffered by the raids targeting Hanrahan Barony was poor discipline among men who felt like they finally had a chance to vent their hatred for the things they’d suffered at the hands of human soldiers and knights.
Even if the men they were fighting weren’t representing the same lords as the ones who had caused their grievances, asking every soldier to make such nuanced distinctions between ’Owain’s men’ and ’Sir Carwyn’s men’ was more than she felt she could ask of people who had lost mothers, sons, wives and bosom friends, not to mention their homes and the lives they’d built there.
The Mongrel Horde had a chip of their own on their shoulders. Many of them were unleashing years of repressed anger at the way they’d been hunted, bullied, and spat upon by the Eldritch world now that they were finally the ones in a position of strength. Ashlynn would hardly call them ’dispassionate’ recruits in this war, but the hatred wasn’t as intense as what people like the survivors of the Heartwood village felt.
"Third army?" Isabell said, raising an eyebrow in surprise. Heila had told her that they’d recruited a significant force from across the mountains, but she’d been vague about how ’significant’ that was. She knew that Heila had obtained the services of several gladiators after some kind of ritual combat, and she assumed they formed a core of ’Ashlynn’s army’, but had she been mistaken?
"When you said ’armies,’ I thought you might be referring to a division between your forces and the forces that belong to Lady Nyrielle," Isabell said. "But you have more than just two armies between the two of you?"
"Nyri gave me command of all the Vale’s forces for this war," Ashlynn said, her face heating slightly as she remembered Nyrielle’s grand, romantic gesture at their betrothal celebration. The memory also helped to cool her own heated emotions and slowed her racing heart as she explained the situation to the Guild Masters.
"In most respects, the third army is the weakest," Ashlynn said. "They aren’t true soldiers, though some of the ones who trained to fight as gladiators in High Fen City’s arenas are as well equipped and capable as any knight. But when I said that these raids served multiple purposes, I meant it."