Chapter 432: Honor as Bait

Once Gustav had taken smooth command of the Second Company and brought it up to the point where it could hold one section of a line, Ted’s reconnaissance unit rejoined us. Having completed his first mission, Ted was in high spirits.

"Good work finding it. Did you find the people hiding out there too?"

"Yes, sir. There was an herbalist living nearby with his wife. They were scared of us at first, but once we shared our liquor they warmed right up. Made the job a lot easier."

The herbalist and his wife seemed to have opened up thanks to Ted’s natural knack for making friends. Ted doesn’t know that the husband is the bastard son of the Mort family. The couple have since moved to Rosenheim.

"I don’t know why they were holed up out there, but once we got friendly they turned out to be pretty decent people. So I suggested they come to Rosenheim, and they took me up on it right away."

"Well done. Living somewhere like that, they’d have been in for a rough time if bandits had found them."

"Hehe, and I found this weird white rock too."

To Ted, who had no idea what kaolin was, it must have looked like nothing more than an oddly shaped stone. He showed me the piece he’d brought back. Hmm, in form it was closer to rock than to clay.

"Do you know what kind of stone this is?"

"Isn’t it just a funny-looking white rock?"

"This rock might well start a war."

"Huh? Is it something like rock salt?"

Ted licked the kaolin and grimaced.

Instead of salt, he would have tasted dirt.

My other retainers offered roughly the same assessment. To them it was nothing but a curious white rock. None of them knew its value. Then again, nobody in Europe does.

Could any of them have imagined this was the main ingredient of porcelain? I’d read that Meissen would be the first to succeed in producing porcelain, a few centuries from now, but perhaps I’ll be the one to bring about that upheaval instead.

That would have to wait, though. Cleaning up the neighborhood came first.

The standoff with Basel, the matter that counted most, had settled into a lull.

With no fewer than eight hundred men gathered at Hissen and drilling endlessly in the forecourt, there was no chance Basel hadn’t noticed. With our defenses ready, the burden on an attacker had grown.

Surprise is the lifeblood of a border skirmish. But both sides had learned of the other in advance, and now we were circling and watching, each holding the other in check. I began to worry they would sound us out and then slink away.

Then, in the third week of February, with Lent already underway, Basel finally sent an envoy. It seemed the Count of Basel’s patience had at last run out.

"I didn’t expect you to come here yourself, sir."

"It is an honor to see you again, my lord."

To my surprise it was Sigmund von Handendorf, the lord of Birsfelden and the man they call the Lightning Knight. Viktor, my own right hand, bristled with fighting spirit at the sight of the count’s.

The two of them going at it would be a sight, but this was no time for that kind of exhibition. Handendorf’s reason for coming as envoy was obvious. The Count of Basel was proposing a contest between nobles.

"Two days from now, in the afternoon, my lord wishes to meet you in a noble battle on the Bantenheim Plain. He proposes limiting each side to five hundred men and settling the score from last time once and for all."

"The score from last time? Didn’t I win? I captured you myself, and Vice Commander Viktor here captured your lord. Calling this settling the score is a strange way to put it."

"I have only conveyed my lord’s words."

"And it isn’t the Bantenheim Plain. It’s the Hissen Plain."

Rosenheim and Basel had long squabbled over what to call the plain lying between Hissen and Bantenheim. The name it goes by can shift the boundary entirely.

Handendorf showed no sign of being rattled by my provocation. I’d meant to sound him out, but as expected of a man with the rare Justice (Good) disposition, he was not easily shaken.

That is probably why he was the one the count sent as envoy.

No formal declaration of war.

Fight on the plain like nobles.

If he had been harboring some other intent, my Manager Scouter would have shown a major shift in his psychology, but like a man incapable of tolerating a lie, he held to solid truth from start to finish.

The noble duel itself was likely genuine.

The Justice (Good) disposition is trustworthy enough.

"The Count of Basel isn’t hiding some other intent, I trust?"

"He has staked his honor as a noble. There can be no other intent."

His utterly unshakable manner left me feeling like the unreasonable one.

The Lightning Knight left those words behind and rode away.

A noble battle is essentially a duel writ large. It amounts to nothing more than nobles playing games, but it was one of the most conventional ways of fighting in this age, and the most common way disputes were settled.

For the rank and file it was a legitimate chance to take spoils, so when word spread through Hissen that the Count of Basel had sent an invitation to battle, the whole place erupted with excitement.

No more of that miserable training. Only the real thing left.

"We’ll send the two Streit companies and two hundred Gale Knights, and the rest can hold Hissen."

"Fortunately we’re able to field our entire main strength."

The commanders gathered in the meeting room took an optimistic view of the situation. August alone sat with a grave expression, lost in thought. The others’ eyes naturally drifted toward him.

Viktor asked, "Sir Einbeck, what’s on your mind?"

"The Count of Basel is a cunning man. He excels at raiding warfare, and he isn’t the sort to chase honor so far as to demand a noble battle. My lord, this could be a trap."

August’s concern sobered the room. From anyone else it might have been dismissed, but coming from the man who held the post of military affairs officer, it carried weight. Still, a noble battle is a form of combat staked on honor.

"The Count of Basel has staked his honor as a noble. He wouldn’t gamble that on a battle this small. If it failed he’d lose far too much. The end of a noble who loses his good name is always a wretched one."

"What concerns me is what comes after the battle. Once it concludes, the count may use the real main force he’s been holding in reserve to launch a surprise attack on Hissen, or on you."

"Hmm, that approach would certainly keep his justification intact."

Once the noble battle was concluded, any fighting beyond it would not be classed as a battle of honor. Matters were usually settled through the noble battle, but carrying on into further fighting was not particularly rare either.

The Count of Basel was known as a cunning prince, exactly as August argued, so the possibility was real enough that we could not afford to leave it unguarded. Of all of us, August knew the count best.

Handendorf had not spoken a lie, but the plan might have been a secret even he was not privy to. A man that cunning might well have used Handendorf’s disposition to win our trust and set the trap.

Of course, this was only speculation. There was no way to be certain.

"Having accepted the noble battle, I have to go to the Hissen Plain no matter what."

"Then we must prepare, my lord! The Count of Basel bears a personal grudge against you."

It was absurd to take a fight between opposing camps personally, but then again, I suppose his pride had been wounded that badly. If I took that grudge as my starting point, would his strategy come into view?

"He’ll strike right after we’ve won and are still clearing the field, I’m sure of it!"

"Wouldn’t he go after Hissen instead, since its defenses would be relatively thin?"

The commanders debated what the count’s play might be, and opinion split broadly along two lines. A surprise attack on me, or an assault on Hissen. The weight of opinion leaned toward the ambush.

"Sir Drek, if it played out like this, it really would be a disaster."

"It would certainly be the worst case for our lord."

What? The worst case? Ted and Drek were off in their own corner, muttering over a map. Those two had hit it off from day one, and apparently even in this grim meeting they had struck up a discussion all their own.

Hmm, starved for attention, are they?

"Sir Drek, have you found some clever trick worth hearing?"

"Sir? Ah, w-well, Reconnaissance Commander Ted Meyer was imagining the worst situation that could befall you, my lord, and the two of us were going over the map to see what was possible."

"The worst situation? An interesting premise. Go on, explain it."

"Reconnaissance Commander! You explain it, quickly!"

"M-me, sir? Sir Drek, wouldn’t it be better if you..."

Are you two doing a comedy routine?

As the room went cold, Drek finally spoke.

"The worst case we came up with is the Count of Basel’s soldiers taking boats down the Main River to Vintenheim and striking it by surprise. Given the enormous investment you have made in that area, the blow would be..."

The room fell silent in an instant. Drek and Ted were thrown by the unexpected reaction. The commanders, as understanding dawned on them, were shaken in turn. The worst conceivable move had just been uncovered.

"My lord! I think we’ve had our attention fixed too narrowly on the Hissen front."

"But using the Main River takes boats. Does Basel have enough of them to carry a whole force?"

Whether Basel had that many boats was the crux of it, and I had an informant who let me make a reasonable inference. That informant was the Archibald family, with whom I had recently opened relations.

"According to the intelligence Archibald sent, mercenaries hired in Breisburg boarded boats on the Main River nearby and crossed into Basel territory. So the boats are already in place."

"Then Vintenheim could be taken!"

Only now was the Count of Basel’s play starting to come into focus. A military clash on the Hissen front could not hurt me much. Vintenheim was another matter entirely.