Page 230 of Onyx Cage: Volume II
“Excellent,” I said, returning to business as usual and ordering them to report.
Lord Ristova spoke up first, carefully clearing his throat before commenting on the status of the second wave of armies. Ram and the Obsidian forces had been slowly making their way here but had turned back when news of the defeat reached them.
Elk and Wolf’s remaining soldiers had begun retreating to their territories as well.
It was more than I had been willing to hope for, though I didn’t imagine our reprieve would last for long. It would at least give us time to regroup and come up with a new strategy.
“And our men?” I asked, glancing around the table until my gaze landed on my cousin.
His mouth was set in a grim line, and I knew before he said the words that the news wouldn’t be good.
“We lost nearly half of the men stationed here,” he said with a small shake of his head. “A fifth of those on the southern line, and a couple hundred men from the western forces.”
I kept my expression neutral, choosing to focus on what this news meant for our strategy going forward instead of the sheer number of casualties. Instead of the never-ending pile of bodies we were still adding to the pyres.
Instead of Pavel’s corpse sailing through the air like one of the stones for their trebuchets.
Rowan’s delicate hand slid over mine, chasing away the memory with the warmth of her touch. She gently squeezed my hand in that same silent offer of comfort she had given me so many times before.
It was a sharp contrast to her blazing eyes in the hallway, an unexpected reassurance that we had more than our recent enmity between us.
I squeezed back after a moment, before focusing once again on our strategy going forward.
“We can assume they’re regrouping for now.” I gave voice to my thoughts from earlier. “What we don’t know is for how long.”
“They’ll have wounded as well,” Taras offered. “They will need time to recover.”
That was true enough. Especially with the aid of the Unclanned shooting arrows into the retreating armies.
“And Mikhail is a coward,” Rowan added, eliciting several gasps from men who were too ignorant to understand that the woman who had charged into battle on their behalf might know enough to have opinions on war. “He was beaten once and retreated. Now that Lynx and Crane aren’t tied up with Iiro, I doubt he’ll risk joining the assault again.”
I nodded, the motion slow and deliberate for the sake of the lords who might want to pretend her points didn’t have merit.
“Mywife,” I stressed the title—that time for her sake—“is correct. That should grant us a reprieve in every direction, but we would be fools to let our guard down. I’ll reallocate our soldiers into new contingents, taking the casualties intoconsideration, and we’ll send those men to fortify our borders. Lord Taras is overseeing the repairs here.”
My cousin nodded.
“In the meantime, I expect the remaining lords to focus on provisioning your keeps and the villages in your purview, as well as beginning the necessary disbursements to the war widows. I won’t have the families of the men who sacrificed their lives starve for our distraction. Dismissed.”
The list was far from comprehensive, but once those priorities were seen to, I could begin to address the rest.
I got to my feet, pulling out Rowan’s chair for her to do the same. I didn’t hold my arm out for her when there was every chance she would refuse it, and appearances still mattered in front of our people. She wordlessly preceded me out of the room, but the speculative glances she cast all the way back to our wing were enough for me to prepare myself for the storm to come.
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED
Based on the pattern of my wife’s moods, most notably the nights she had come to my room in Lochlann, I estimated that she would come bursting through my door just shortly after midnight.
So I worked until late into the night, stopping just before the twelfth hour to send for chilled glasses for vodka. Then I braced for a battle that was entirely different from the kind I had been fighting lately, even as the stakes felt nearly as high, and the odds of victory every bit as slim.
I didn’t have to wait long for her to push open my door. There were no passageways here, but her entry was otherwise the same as it had been at Chridhe.
“Lemmikki,” I greeted her from the armchair near the fire. “I wasn’t expecting you to come barreling in here tonight.”
I waved toward her waiting drink in case the sarcasm in my voice hadn’t been evident, an intentional reminder that I knew who she was. She froze in the doorway, muscles tensing like she might turn back around. Then she stalked forward, all but slamming the door behind her before she yanked her vodka off the table and downed half the glass.
We sat in silence while I steeled myself for the volley of arrows she was no doubt preparing to rain down on me, each one burning with the fuel of her pent-up resentment.
She eyed me for a long moment over her cup, like she wasn’t sure where to start. When she did speak, even she looked vaguely surprised by her words.