Thraxton, as usual, looked as if his belly pained him. Perhaps he even looked as if it pained him more than usual. “Ah, Brigadier Ned. I am very pleased to see you.” If he was pleased, he hadn’t bothered telling his face about it.
“What can I do for you, sir?” Ned asked. The sooner he was gone, the happier he would be.
“I am not pleased that you led your men so far afield while chasing Whiskery Ambrose’s unicorn-riders,” Thraxton said, pacing back and forth through the parlor and looking at the wall rather than at Ned of the Forest.
“Would you have been more pleased if they’d come down on us and rampaged all around?” Ned demanded.
“I would have been more pleased had your men been closer to my hand and more ready to obey my orders,” the Braggart answered. What orders? Ned thought scornfully. If you’d had any halfway sensible orders to give, we’d be in Rising Rock by now. Thraxton went on, “Accordingly, I am detaching three regiments from your command and transferring them to the control of Brigadier Spinner, the cavalry commander for the division led-formerly led, I should say-by Dan of Rabbit Hill.”
Ned most cordially loathed Brigadier Spinner. From everything he could tell, the feeling was mutual. “You can’t do that!” he blurted.
“You are mistaken.” Thraxton’s voice came cold as a southron blizzard. “I can. I shall. I have.” Relenting ever so slightly, he added, “These regiments will be returned to you after Spinner comes back from his planned raid east of Rising Rock.”
“If you want my men, why in the seven hells don’t you send me out?” Ned barked.
“Because if I send Spinner, I have some assurance he will do as I command and return when I command,” Count Thraxton replied, more coldly still. “You have given me no reason for any such confidence. You may pick the regiments you wish to turn over to him.” Another tiny concession.
Too tiny-far too tiny. But the order was legal. Ned knew that all too well. If he refused it, Thraxton would sack him, too. Choking back his fury-he wouldn’t give the Braggart the satisfaction of showing it-he snarled, “Yes, sir,” saluted again, and stalked out.
Had Brigadier Spinner been standing outside the farmhouse, Ned might have drawn sword on him. But the other general of unicorn-riders was nowhere to be seen. Still fuming, Ned of the Forest stomped back to his own men. Soldiers who saw him had the good sense to stay out of his way and not ask unfortunate questions.
He arrived among the unicorn-riders in the foulest of foul tempers. Seeing his visage, Colonel Biffle hurried over to him in some alarm, asking, “Is something wrong, sir?”
“Wrong? You just might say so, Biff. Yes, you just might.” The whole story poured out of Ned, a long howl of fury and frustration.
“He can’t do that,” Biffle blurted when Ned finally finished.
“I told him the same thing, but I was wrong, and so are you,” Ned said. “If he wants to bad enough, he bloody well can. That’s what being a general is all about.” He said something else, too, something his beard and mustache fortunately muffled. After a moment spent recapturing his temper, he went on more audibly: “The one reason I’ll sit still for it at all is that he did promise he’d give me my men back once Spinner was done with them. If it wasn’t for that…” His left hand dropped to the hilt of his saber.
“Whose regiments will you… lend to Brigadier Spinner, sir?” Biffle paused in the middle there to make sure he found and used the right word, the word that would not ignite Ned further.
“I was thinking yours’d be the one I keep for my own self,” Ned replied, and Colonel Biffle preened a little. Ned of the Forest slapped him on the back, hard enough to stagger him. “He’s a pile of unicorn turds, Biff, but there’s not a single stinking thing we can do about it.” He yawned. “Only thing I want to do now is sleep. When I wake up, maybe I’ll find out Thraxton the Braggart was nothing but a bad dream. Too much to hope for, I reckon.” He went into his tent.
When he woke up the next morning, Count Thraxton and what he’d done remained all too vivid in his memory. But, as he’d told Biffle, he couldn’t do anything about the Army of Franklin’s sour commanding general. What he could do was get himself some breakfast; his belly was empty as, as… Empty as Thraxton’s head, he thought happily, and went out to get some food in better spirits.
He was sitting on the ground, eating fried pork and hard rolls and talking things over with Colonel Biffle, when a runner came up, saluted, and said, “Count Thraxton’s compliments, sir, and he asked me to give you this.” He handed Ned a rolled sheet of paper sealed with Thraxton’s seal, saluted again, and hurried off.
“What’s he want now?” Biffle asked.
“Don’t know. Suppose I’d better find out.” Ned broke the wax seal with a grimy thumbnail. He wasn’t fluent with pen in hand, but he had no trouble reading. And Thraxton’s hand, though spidery, was more legible than most. Upon due consideration, he wrote, I have decided that, with a view to the best interests of the Army ofFranklin as a whole, your cavalry regiments shall in fact be permanently transferred to the command of Brigadier Spinner. Trusting this meets with your approval, I remain… He closed with the usual polite, lying phrases.
Ned of the Forest sprang to his feet, rage on his face. So did Colonel Biffle, alarm on his. “What’s wrong, sir?” he asked, as he had so often lately.
“That lying son of a bitch!” Ned ground out. “I’m going to tell him where to go and how to get there, and I may just send him on the trip.” He stormed off toward Thraxton’s headquarters, Biffle in his wake.
An adjutant tried to turn him aside from Count Thraxton. He brushed past the man as if he didn’t exist and roared into the parlor. Thraxton gave him an icy stare. “What is the meaning of this intrusion?” he demanded.
Ned of the Forest took a long, deep, angry breath. “I’ll tell you what. You commenced your cowardly and contemptible persecution of me soon after the battle of Pottstown Pier, and you have kept it up ever since. You did it because I reported to Nonesuch facts, while you reported gods-damned lies. You have begun again your work of spite and persecution and kept it up. This is the second formation of unicorn-riders organized and equipped by me without thanks to you or King Geoffrey. These men have won a reputation second to none in the army, but, taking advantage of your position as the commanding general in order to humiliate me, you have taken these brave men from me.”
He thrust his left index finger at Count Thraxton’s face. Thraxton retreated into a corner and sank down onto a stool. Ned pressed after him. “I have stood your meanness as long as I intend to. You have played the part of a gods-damned scoundrel, and are a coward, and if you were any part of a man I would slap your jaws and force you to resent it. You have threatened to arrest me for not obeying your orders promptly. I dare you to do it, and I say to you that if you ever again try to interfere with me or cross my path it will be at the peril of your life.”
Thraxton said never a word. He sat there, pale and shaking, while Ned kept prodding with that finger. At last, snarling in disgust, Ned turned on his heel and stormed out of the farmhouse. Colonel Biffle followed. Once Biffle was outside, Ned thunderously slammed the door.
As the headed back toward the unicorn-riders’ camp, Biffle remarked, “Well, you are in for it now.”
“You think so?” Ned shook his head to show he didn’t. “He’ll never say a word about it. He’ll be the last man to mention it. Mark my word, he’ll take no action in the matter. I will ask to be relieved and transferred to a different part of the fight, and he will not oppose it.”
“I hope you’re right, sir.” The regimental commander didn’t sound convinced.
“I reckon I am,” Ned said. “And if I chance to be wrong, I’ll kill the mangy son of a bitch and do King Geoffrey a favor.”