106 Between a Rock and a Hard Place (1/2)
”Brother, what will we do now? This is terrible!” When Sawo was interrupted by the noisy shout, he had tried his best to relax his battered body, eyes closed and back leaned against the wooden wall behind him. When he opened his eyes, he saw his cousin, source of the noise, pace around the dirty cabin while the unhinged warrior threw glances of hope in his direction.
”No need for panic, cousin,” Sawo answered, as a tranquil smile played around his lips. ”Everything worked out to satisfaction, did it not?”
”Satisfaction? Satisfaction!?” While one of his hands held back the unkempt strands of hair from obscuring his view, Tawo paced back and forth in their little hut, clearly still affected by the excitement they had gone through only hours before. ”We will get killed, brother. You understand that, do you not? We will die, all of us. Have you not seen how the king's guards handled our attack?!”
”A fine warrior you are. This here would be why I am the elder brother, why I take charge. Not to worry though. In time, you will get used to proper battle.”
Sawo reminded the silly youngster that his subjective impression didn't represent reality. When he thought back to the noise and smell of the underworld wafting across that battlefield, the terror of the night all around them, Sawo himself went weak in his knees. Even so, the former lord was a man of endless optimism. Thus, he sat up straight again, determined to calm down his cousin further. He would once again be the one to lead their family forward. Not to mention, all the running in circles really started to get on his nerves anyways.
”Everything went just as planned, so why complain now? Just as I said, we left the secret message at one of the bandit's caches along the way to make contact. The northern river king got our message and assembled the bandit kings together. Their charge on the labor camp might not have been enough to take out the foreign dogs of that false king, but at least we gave them a good punch. And when they breached that prisoner camp, we freed a lot of our old warriors as well. Those dogs would do well to remember this lesson: Never again shall they mess with the great Sawo or his family. Now that we are free men once again, we will do nothing but unite our forces with Harkay, that town in the mud. Our troops united, retaking the city will be an easy feat. Remember that we still hold the minds of the city people. Once we arrive with our forces, the good folk of Saniya will simply reopen our gates to free themselves from the tyrannical rule of the false king.”
Never would Sawo's unbreakable heart allow himself to give in to tyranny. He would fight for his freedom, for his right to rule, at any price. Even so, there were always those who would fail to see true determination and grit for what they were. Those souls less noble than himself would not serve as an obstacle however, or so Sawo thought.
”What're you talking about you arrogant fop!?” A massive noise returned from outside the walls, to speak for those poorer minds without vision.
”Ah, Kullu. Please enter.” With a smile, Sawo welcomed his servant into his private cabin. Back in Huaylas, the young man named Kullu had been a simple lumberjack under the employ of his warrior family. Although Kullu had always been a bit of an oaf, the man possessed great strength since childgood, far beyond his peers. Thus, when Sawo had been appointed as administrator of Saniya, he had taken the lumberjack along on his journey, to handle the rougher tasks required of a ruler.
”It's not 'Kullu' anymore. I'd rather you'd call me river ox.”
Ultimately, Kullu had proven invaluable to Sawo's rule when he had established himself as the first of the river kings. However, in the process he had lost much of his seemly humility.
”You dare talk back to your master!? Do not forget who brought you to where you are now!”
”And where is that!?” Kullu barked back. Shocked at his servant's repeated disobedience, Sawo took a few seconds to recollect his thoughts, long enough for the bandit chief to calm down as well. ”I'm sorry, master Sawo. Still, where are we? Stuck in a swamp, outlaws, with no way out. And what do you do? Sit here, and plan to take over the world. At least master Tawo is man enough to face the facts and look distraught.”
Dumbfounded by the bite which rang from the bandit's tensed body, Sawo once again failed to react. This time however, his cousin sprang in to save him any further insult and embarrassment.
”How are your men, Kullu? In the chaos of our escape, under nothing but moonlight, we failed to see much of the actual fighting. Still, the noises of battle had us worried.”
With a heavy sigh, Tawo let himself down and sat cross-legged on the rough hemp carpet which covered the ground. Like everything else in the hideout of the ox bandits, the cloth was covered with a thin film of moisture. However uncomfortable their surroundings were to Sawo, the servant must have been used to it by now. After all, he had already spent close to a year in the area.
”It's not good. I alone lost sixteen people. Caught or killed. No matter what master Sawo says, those kingsmen were good. Proper soldiers. And we attacked a fortified position against an army like that. I'm not sure we killed even a single one of them in return.”
As always when he was in frantic thought, which the nervous Tawo was often, Sawo's cousin rubbed his mustache in an attempt to smoothe out the unruly bristles. ”What about the other kings?”
Kullu looked back up to the second of his masters, with dull eyes framed in dark rings.
”...no better, master Tawo. Even my own men talk of revolt, let alone the other river kings. Those guys have no loyalty to Lord Ichilia or masters Sawo and Tawo. They're locals after all. No idea how we get out of this. All the others are fed up with their lot. From the south, that Harkay town collects more and more people and increases its influence... And from the coast, those new roadways spread out like a plague, with our people squeezed in the middle. Our space gets smaller, and we can't do a thing. And now all of us have lost this many men, things just keep getting worse and worse.”
”No, wait,” Sawo finally interjected, startled back to life by Kullu's bleak interpretation of their circumstances, ”what about all the men we broke free from the prison camp? There were almost five hundred warriors in our group, all of them cultivators. Would those not more than replace the numbers we have lost in the attack?”
With a smile forced out of sadness, Kullu turned to face his first master again.
”Hahaha. Master Sawo is joking. We never breached the labor camp, not really. Rather than free all prisoners, our attack opened a small hole in their defenses, only for a bit. All in all, we got out no more than forty men or so. Even from those, it looks like most ran away out of habit rather than from conviction. A good number have moaned that we shouldn't have come, that they'd rather go back to the camps, to safe labor and good food. I'm not kidding, our position is hopeless. Did you know, there's been talk about handing you over to the new King Corco, to strike a deal and get treatment like the others in the labor camps.”
”What!” With a mighty shout befitting of a great lord, Sawo stood and built his imposing frame above his meek servant.
”How dare these lesser men even think about taking advantage of this great lord! They should just wait, as soon as I have the forces of Saniya under my control once again, I will return the favor with salt and sulfur! Kullu, your great loyalty honors you. Once I regain my rightful place as ruler, you will be rewarded handsomely.”
Sawo had expected a great reaction from his precious bestowal of favor. Kneeling, profuse words of thanks, even tears wouldn't have been exaggerated.
However, what answered Sawo was far from what he had expected. All his servant did was look up to him with the same tired face as before. No worship, no anger and no mockery. All feelings inside the lumberjack seemed to have died off.