Chapter 42: SIX MEDICAL WAGONS

DIANA’S POV

The second field packet asked Blackharrow for six medical wagons.

Diana read that line twice.

WESTERN COMMAND REMAINS IN FIELD. SEND SIX MEDICAL WAGONS. HOLD INNER RESERVE. WESTERN ROAD REMAINS OPEN.

Six medical wagons.

The message did not say why.

Daric stood beside the lower-court command table while the field clerk copied the dispatch into the Citadel register.

Diana wrote:

HOW MANY ARE HURT?

Daric looked at the page.

"It does not say."

WHY SIX?

"It does not say."

She hated that answer more every time he gave it.

Tavia had already moved.

"Four wagons go now," she told the quartermaster. "Use the Lower Fen team and the two reserve teams from the eastern court."

"The other two?"

"As soon as the south-route horses are changed."

"What about Hollow Ridge?"

"Nothing changes."

The quartermaster nodded and began issuing orders.

Diana followed Tavia toward the transport court.

"You need six wagons," Tavia told one clerk. "That does not mean you empty every route attached to Blackharrow."

The first teams were already being harnessed.

Medical crates went aboard first.

Then blankets.

Water.

Spare braces.

Bandages.

Equipment Diana could not identify.

Nothing about the work looked hurried until she noticed how few people were speaking.

The first wagon rolled toward the gate.

A second followed.

People inside the nearby family rooms heard them.

Conversation faded.

No casualty count had arrived.

No names.

No explanation.

They did not need one to understand why empty medical wagons were going north.

Alma came to stand beside Diana.

"Maybe they are sending more than they need."

Maybe.

Diana did not write it.

Daric entered the transport court behind them with Captain Iven Sorn.

"Commander, the western signal changed again."

"What pattern?"

The officer told him.

Daric listened.

"Bring the inner reserve to mounted readiness."

Sorn stopped.

"Send them?"

"No."

"Six medical wagons were just requested."

"I know."

"If the line is taking casualties..."

"Then Raigoro knows the reserve exists."

Sorn looked toward the gate.

Daric continued.

"He ordered it held unless field command requests reinforcement or the Citadel itself is threatened."

"And if the request cannot get through?"

"Then the signal towers have failure procedures. We have not received one."

Sorn still looked unhappy.

Daric did not seem offended by that.

"Ready them. Do not move them."

"Yes, Commander."

He left.

Diana watched the reserve court begin reorganizing again.

Daric had more men available.

He was deliberately refusing to send them.

Two days ago, Diana might have thought obedience meant doing exactly what Raigoro said because Raigoro had said it.

This looked different.

Daric knew why the reserve existed.

He also knew why Raigoro had left it behind.

Until evidence changed, he would not solve fear by taking soldiers away from the place they had been assigned to protect.

The fifth medical wagon rolled out.

Then the sixth.

The gate closed behind them.

No one knew how many people they were going to collect.

The first confirmed names belonged to wounded soldiers.

Daric read the relay beside the military desk while a clerk began making copies for the infirmary.

Diana had not intended to stand close enough to read them.

She did anyway.

The first three names meant nothing to her.

The fourth did.

SERGEANT NOLL. SECOND COMPANY.

Diana stopped which Alma noticed.

"What?"

Diana pointed.

Sergeant Noll.

The man from the training court. He had sat against the barrier with his helmet off while another soldier threw him a water skin. He had missed it.

Only after noon, sir.

Diana had known him for less than a minute.

Apparently that was enough.

The name no longer looked like the others.

She wrote:

HOW BADLY?

The clerk checked.

"Leg wound. Blood loss. Stable when transferred from the forward line."

Alive.

Diana nodded.

Movement beside the family-room entrance caught Diana’s attention.

The woman who had spoken to her earlier was there again.

Her son served in Second Company.

She had asked whether the western line was holding when none of them knew enough to answer.

Now she came toward the military desk and looked over the copied list.

"His name is not here."

Diana remembered the question the woman had asked before and knew what she wanted this absence to mean.

Daric answered before false reassurance could.

"This is only the first confirmed wounded relay."

The woman looked at him.

"So if his name is not there?"

"It means his name is not on this relay."

Nothing more.

The woman absorbed that, then nodded.

"Thank you."

She returned to the family room and chose the end of a bench from which she could still see the lower court.

Diana watched her sit.

A list had finally arrived, and most of the people waiting inside Blackharrow still knew exactly as much about the person they loved as they had an hour ago.

Sergeant Noll’s name had given Diana one answer.

Alive.

Everyone whose person was missing from the page had received another reason to keep listening for horses.

Another name followed.

Then another.

The remaining names belonged to strangers, but Diana knew each one would matter to someone waiting inside Blackharrow.

Daric gave the list to the medical office.

"Do not issue family notices unless the condition requires one. These are treatment transfers, not death reports."

The clerk left.

No one said how many more names had not reached them yet.

Tavia returned from the transport office with an empty dispatch board under one arm.

"The wagons are clear of the inner road."

Daric nodded.

"Replacement teams?"

"Two ready if requested."

"Keep them ready."

"Already done."

Tavia moved away again.

Diana watched her.

During the Muster, Tavia’s knowledge had made Diana think of everything she herself did not understand about Blackharrow.

Today that knowledge meant six wagons had gone north without taking food away from Hollow Ridge.

There were different ways to stand beside a battle.

Another horn sounded from the western tower.

Diana turned before anyone else spoke.

The pattern differed from the earlier signal.

Daric listened until the final note ended.

Diana raised the slate.

WHAT?

"The western command changed position."

THEY RETREATED?

"I did not say that."

Diana stared at him.

WHAT DID YOU SAY?

"That western command changed position."

GOOD OR BAD?

"I don’t know."

This time Daric’s answer carried the same frustration Diana had been swallowing all day.

No written dispatch followed the signal.

Diana looked toward the gate through which she had watched Raigoro leave.

Somewhere beyond it were Captain Arven, Captain Veyr, Meris, Sergeant Noll, four infantry companies, engineers, scouts, and hundreds of people whose families were waiting inside Blackharrow.

And Raigoro.

The signal could tell her that his army had moved.

It could not tell her whether he was still alive inside it.