11 CH10:SCs:Let The Hunt Begin

"Dear Friend, I am sorry to tell you this, but I am going to demote your son after the war. He is not fit to lead his Brigade as a Colonel. I know this must cause you some pain, but I will make it up to you by winning the war. Your friend Stenworth." Message for Rembrant Recrest. Undelivered.

#Revon

Revon wakes to a pulsating pain on the side of his head. He reflexively lifts his hand to soothe the source of his agony. irritation was all he accomplish by that feat. Revon ganders around his person, his flintlock pistol is gone, his father's rapier also. The idea of losing his father's rapier edges him into a panic.

"Calm down, Colonel, you are in the hospice." Doctor Radolf says, approaching him in a measured pace.

"Where is my sword?" Revon ganders around the hospice, the smell of the place is smelting his function to search.

"Your sword and your other belongings are at your Officer's tent. Colonel."

"I see, what happened doctor?"

"You got a strike on the left side of your head, giving you a minor concussion and knocking you off your feet."

Revon struggling to sit up from his cot tries to remember what got him here in the first place. He remembers having a tense discussion with Mereck and Dresken, and then two lieutenants holding a soldier for disciplinary court. It hits him then, what occurred during that event.

"Those two lieutenants? What happened to them?" Revon pleads Radolf to answer. Radolf glances to the side to another cot, who lay Rod with a white cloth wrapped around carefully around his chest.

"Lieutenant Rod, of the 5th Brigade of 93rd Regiment of Foot, suffers mild broken Cartilago costalis, nearly fracturing his floating ribs. In others, the man got hit by an invisible cannon going half speed into his chest. Which is quite extraordinary.

"What about the other Lieutenant."

"Lieutenant Stan, of the 5th…"

"Yeah, yeah."

"The man's jaw is fractured to an extreme level, I had to practically wrap his whole head so his jaw does fall off out of his mouth. He has been eating and drinking with a straw since then."

"What about Gulcasa what happened to him."

"Well… That interesting specimen, up and gone vanish on us in the middle of the night. It was a shock to everyone who heard. He apparently just walked out of the camp without anyone alerting or noticing. Funny that." Doctor Radolf tries to ponder how Gulcasa could have accomplished such a feat, let alone the damage he causes to Radolf's new patients.

"Mind if I take a sample of your blood, Colonel Revon Recrest?" The doctor inquires offhandedly.

Revon scrutinizes him with a sense of disgust. 'This is one odd doctor.'

"Whatever for doctor?" Revon questions.

"Oh, just some scholarly studies."

Revon shakes his head in the negative and shakily got off the cot.

"I got to order my troops, I don't have time diddling my thumbs in this hospice." Revon adamantly says, glaring at the sight of injured soldiers in cots moaning and swearing.

"Besides, this place reeks of shit and vomit."

Radolf chortles out a laugh as Revon shakily tries an escape the clutches of the hospice.

"Before you go, take this... medicinal drug." Radolf hands Revon a bag of sun leaf frills, they were orange flower frills meant for consumption or injected into the blood to add short-induce relief, with the side of effects of exuberance and euphoric trips.

Revon knows and remembers clearly what sun leaf can do, he reflects his past to his teens where he studied in one of the prestigious college known as the Sanctum of Scholars, situated on the trading city Tranquila, part of the Marcian City States. He was galavanting with the cities nobilities, trading duels for women, and injecting himself with said drug throughout those hot summer nights, the glimmer dust reflected by the sunsets in that desert city were memories he has deeply treasured.

Reanna always envied Revons' adventurous escapades without their parents around. He won't tell her about this one, he adamantly reflects. He gingerly takes the offered medicine, he then turns to exit into the daylight.

The red refracted from his hair as the sunlight bath him with the day. He was a tall man, at 6'1 for his 21st years. He was considered handsome in most of the noble circles he cavorts with, with a hard but defined jawline, and piercing blue ocean eyes that would refract with the light into shallow sparkles.

Revon breathes the fresh air, he feels motivated and reassured of his well being. Now he needs to go talk to his Commandant Dresken about the escaped prisoner and the other happenings in camp.

As Revon approaches his tent home, he saw a fair lot of soldiers guarding the perimeters of the tents. A soldier halted movements further inside the camp.

"Halt, who goes there. State your name and Rank." The man haltingly questions. Revon was flabbergasted at the soldier's actions, could not he see his shoulder epaulets that signify his rank as a Colonel of the red army. Then it hit him, he is not wearing his coat with his rank, but a white tunic splattering on unknown blood on his person. It was not his blood, but blood from other patients in the hospice.

Revon exhales to himself, he was about to rebuke a man, who had every cause to question his entrance to an officer's tent.

"I am Revon Recrest, Colonel of the 5th Brigade of the Red Army."

The man gives an impromptu salute.

"Pardon sir, I did not know you were a Colonel." Revon returns the man's salute. He then enters the room that was in an uproar of commotions.

"I told you, I will lead the center and right flank army into there center. Overwhelming the Renforts center force with numbers." An elderly gruff man said in his officer coat.

The man's coat was gilded with gold trims but patched up so many times that it looks like second-hand clothing a play right would use for his stage. The man was the Marshal Stenworth, Marshal of the Red Army, in other words, Revon's boss.

"Marshal, the plan will take a few more days, the Rhaodians supply lines are slowing down our decision to move out our forces to our intended target, Sir." An aid replies, ready to cower from a rebuke from the old marshal.

"Why you-" The marshal was about to curse the man as a sheep pricker, one of marshals usual insults Revon surmised.

"Marshal, the Rhaodian supply lines have been assaulted by enemies and bandits, you cannot blame the Rhaodians and you're officers for such misfortune." The priest Mereck says in an annoyingly pleading voice.

"I'll curse thy mother, or whoever I want to if I don't see my orders not followed by the letter." The Marshal ranted.

Revon enters the marshal peripheral vision, the marshal turns to Revon's direction.

"Ah if it isn't the man, who lost me 3000 men, and a deserter who has recently woke up from his fretful nap? I hope you were not dreaming of me socking your face in with my bayonet. I want you to experience it first hand before you imagine the slight you cause me." The Marshal growls out.

"Sir, I-"

"Men you are dismissed." The Marshal interrupts Revon's excuses, ordering his generals and some of his aids to leave the tent.

"If it wasn't for your father, wanting his son to play a leading role in his army, I would have you flogged in front of these fine gentlemen and dishonorably discharge out of this army."

"Sir...I"

"You lost me 3,000 good fighting men."

"But I-"

"But nothing boy!" The Marshal growls out.

"Listen here boy, I have no time to debate with your adolescent self." The Marshal glares up to Revon's tall stature, piercing him into silence.

"You are going to take a platoon of your men and hunt down this deserter who have disgraced your officer and your person. You are not needed here."

"But sir the fight is."

"Silence, you fool. You did not earn your officer rank, but had it given upon you. Yes, you are an educated fellow, and I hear you are fine with the rapier. But other than that, you are a complete amateur when it comes to warfare."

Revon admitted silence gave vindication to the Marshal's words.

"So you will take these orders, hunt that miscreant of a soldier. And come back here at the end of the battle, with me holding a noose. It will depend on the upcoming battle if I add another noose." The Marshal implies.

"Yes, Sir."

"I would also like to accompany, the young colonel on his just cause of hunting the deserter, Marshal?" The priest Mereck snidely ask as he glares disapprovingly towards Revon's direction.

"Whatever, I don't care. If Thy Mother can't fuck me while I wait for battle. Then I have no use for you Rhaodian priest on my battlefield." The Marshal offhandedly says.

Mereck's face distorted with disgust.

"You're dismissed, Colonel." The Marshal sarcastically sneers.

Revon salutes, turn about face and leaves his officer's tent as fast as possible without tripping. Depression hits mood and ego, he was such a show head for his father in the Army, he realizes. He glowers back to the tent, where Mereck is following him. The man was smirking as if he knows that Revon is going to fail the order that the Marshal just gave him.

Dresken walks by Revon's side. Revon glimpses him holding his rapier, and his flintlock wrapped our his officer's coat. Dresken was alas carrying a blunderbuss on his back tied with his military graded rifle musket.

"I am assuming you are also coming with?"

"Yes, Colonel. I was about to be leading the company to search, but you happened to wake up to take command." Dresken chortles out a reply.

"Should have stayed in bed, instead of doing such nonsense." Revon mumbles to himself. Two men also follow behind them. The two grenadiers Gulcasa cruelly wounded. The one that was leading was a heavy set man with an eye patch on his right eye, the other one had a cask around his neck who was gingerly walking to the side of the one with the eyepatch.

"This sorry lot and 45 others are going to chase one deserter." Revon forlorn.

#Balic

"Sir, the manor has been cleanly wiped of any witness or guardsmen." A man with a black handkerchief covering the lower section of his face, says behind Balic. Balic ignoring the man glares past the courtyard gates into the darkness of the forest within.

Balic grumbles at the idea of letting his prey go, but he had no choice. He could not estimate the skill of the elderly man he just witnesses murder one of his men with a dagger throw. The idea of it ridicules his survival instincts. That Siger, was an unknown to him, and he hated unknowns.

He stomps the ground in one his rage fits. Spritz of blood spurts out of his breastplate from the side. That Jayce fellow who he recently had fought, sneakily pierced his side with that damn rapier. He was skilled, Balic can respect that. He was after all a former Rhaodian Knight, trained and prepared for any extreme variables. But not the variable he expected, he was dishonored and exiled from the Order. The Order's reasons were that it was because of his cruelty and the savage display towards his foes, a method uncouth for the noble Order. 'Apparently, it wasn't to knightly. Huh?'

Balic sneers to himself. The way he kills is not Knightley, he burst out a laugh from the idea of it. Those hypocrite knights murder people every day for their supposedly just cause. Killing is killing, that's what he thought, it does not matter how the method is executed, as long as it's done, it's done.

That's why Balic joined the Inquisitor Order, yes they were fanatics of Thy Mother, bless the earth as she is. But, Balic knew the Order was right for him, they don't care of the method, as long as it's done, they will accept you to the cause, to hunting down the abominations, and their offspring.

Balic remembers the smell of red locks from that noble girl Reanna, his groin itches to taste her virtue. He groans as the idea of ravaging her as she cries for her savior to save her, that's why he kept Jayce alive, after all. That boy wounded Balic, now he needs to suffer, physically and mentally.

"Sir the men are ready." The inquisitor behind him says. Balic looks back, at the 30 men, and the one holding Jayce near.

"Lit it up." Balic orders. The 30 men around him took their torches and began to torch the household man.

Wood smoked and crumble at the force of the heat, wooden pillars tearing, collapses the silence of the dark blood-soaked night. The summer Recrest manor crumbles down to the inferno birthing within, the flames scorch Balic's back as he stares into the forest, hoping the children who now ran for their lives, look back at such a destruction display of their memories.

"Let the hunt begin, boys…"