\hypertarget{chapter-41-coterie}{%
\chapter{Coterie}\label{chapter-41-coterie}}



\epigraph{``The only thing more inconvenient than being part of an alliance
is not being part of it.''}{Prince Luis of Tenerife}



The last time I'd seen anything near this scale had been the Doom of
Liesse, when every major Callowan and Legion force west of the Hwaerte
had engaged the Praesi and wights under the Diabolist. Yet, however
apocalyptic that day had been, in the end it'd been only one day. The
Grand Alliance's attempt to reclaim Hainaut would be a great deal more
sustained than that.

The numbers were staggering, when put to ink and impossible to ignore.
The Army of Callow would be fielding, in this campaign, a little under
thirty thousand soldiers -- the entire Second, Third and Fourth Army.
Counting only the forces of Lady Aquiline and Lord Tazin the Dominion
would be offering up at least twenty thousand, but if Lord Yannu's
promises of Alavan captains came through the numbers should end up
closer to twenty-five. General Pallas had seven thousand in fighting
fit, though before mustering the full roster of the Tyrant's Own she'd
want horses brought in since the kataphraktoi were running low on
remounts. General Rumena still had thirty thousand to pledge to the
offensive, the thinned numbers having actually strengthened the
southernmost host of the Firstborn in several ways.

The exact numbers of the Proceran forces in Hainaut were harder to
determine, on the other hand, since their chain of command was the stuff
of nightmares for any Legion-taught officer. As in most things warfare,
the Lycaonese were a notch above the Alamans: the armies of Hannoven and
Neustria were under the combined command of the Iron Prince, they shared
supplies and kept track of their casualties. While they relied a little
too heavily on the nebulous rank of `captains' for my tastes -- officers
that could command anywhere from a hundred to a thousand foot, horse or
even a mixed force of both! -- but they were typically well organized
and well trained. The northern royals fielded, between the two of them,
a solid eighteen thousand. Including four thousand of that solid
Lycaonese heavy horse we could never have too much of.

The Alamans forces were contrastingly disorganized, which to my admitted
surprise hadn't even proved to be entirely their fault. The last
Princess of Hainaut -- elder sister to the current one -- had hired
every fantassin company she could get her hands on the moment Keter
began to stir, but a lot of those had taken severe losses failing to
defend the northern shore. Half the originally contracted companies no
longer existed or no longer fielded the amount of men they said they
did, and maybe a quarter of the current mercenaries in Volignac service
were `successor-companies'. Those were, essentially, mercenary companies
raised from the survivors of broken ones and laying claim to an old
contract under a different name as the successor of the disbanded
company.

The mercenaries were trouble, and not just because they were fiercely
independent. Fantassin captains habitually lied about their numbers so
that they might claim more supplies from the Grand Alliance, or bargain
for better remuneration, and weren't above lending each other soldiers
to fake their way through inspections. We hung the captains we caught at
this, but that tended to lead to desertions so we had to be careful. It
didn't help that even the principality Alamans troops had their issues.
There were the forces of three royals serving in Hainaut: Prince Etienne
of Brabant, Prince Ariel of Arans and naturally Princess Beatrice of
Hainaut. The Arans soldiery was steady, but also under the prince's
personal command and he was often reluctant to take risks. If Hainaut
fell his principality was the next on the block, he often reminded us,
but for all that the Brabant folk were arguably more trouble.

Not because they were as cautious, on the contrary: Prince Etienne had
bankrupted himself arming everyone he could in his principality and
sending them north when the situation in Hainaut first went bad, which
while a brave and necessary gesture was also the source of the trouble.
Maybe a third of the Brabantines were actual trained soldiers, even
their `officers' were green as grass and though when they had the upper
hand they were enthusiastic fighters their morale was otherwise\ldots{}
fragile. I'd not call a coward anyone who took up arms against Keter,
but when you put shoemakers in armour and sent them to fight the likes
of beorns they had a distinct tendency to rout. The conscripts had to be
closely watched, and carefully used.

The forces under Princess Beatrice Volignac were the fewest, since
they'd been bled hard failing to defend their homeland, which I found a
damned shame as, practically speaking, it was a force entirely made of
veterans. They fought hard, mercilessly, and with a burning spite I
could only admire. They were also in some ways the least well-equipped,
and the heaviest draw on Grand Alliance resources of the forces in the
region: the capital of Hainaut had fallen, as had most its largest
cities, so there was little coin behind them and only sparse land to
feed them. At this point, the House of Volignac had more fortresses
under its rule than towns -- and its armies weren't even the largest
force within those fortresses.

Accounting for the inevitable lies and grandstanding, our estimates had
the total Alamans forces in Hainaut at around forty-one thousand.
Fantassins companies made up for about fifteen thousand of that, and the
Brabant conscripts maybe another ten to twelve thousand, so that meant
more than half the number was less than reliable. If we got lucky the
armies of Twilight's Pass would be able to send around ten thousand our
way, mostly Bremen and Rhenia men with maybe a few from Brus. Which
meant that at the end of the day, when all those forces would be brought
together, there would be around one hundred and sixty thousand soldiers
on the field. And that would be on the Grand Alliance's side alone. We
were, typically, outnumbered at least two to one by the dead.

The campaign hadn't even begun and already the numbers involved were
giving me a headache, so naturally I'd consulted the finest military
mind at my disposal as soon as she was fit to be scried.

``It's logistically impossible for you to feed that many soldiers as a
single force,'' Marshal Juniper of the Red Shields bluntly told me.
``You'll have to separate them into several armies or you'll run out of
supplies after a month or so.''

``Our scouts have confirmed the Dead King left the roads mostly
intact,'' I pointed out. ``If we march along Julienne's Highway and
spread out to prevent raiding, we could have an active supply line.''

Named after an ancient First Princess of Procer, the highway was one of
the major roads of northeastern Procer: it began in Salia, headed east
through the city of Aisne, up into Brabant through the major trade city
of Tourges and ended up north in the city of Hainaut, capital of the
eponymous principality. It was large, made for wagons and very
well-maintained. The Dead King had skimped on the upkeep some, our
scouts had said -- which made sense since he didn't usually use wagons
of his own -- but ensured it remained in state to be used by his troops,
and therefore ours. It was pretty much impossible to feed this large an
army without using carts and wagons to bring in rations so I expected
we'd need to do some repairs while we campaigned, but my sapper corps
should be capable of handling that much.

``The Hidden Horror will ruin that road the moment it becomes obvious
it's the axis of your offensive,'' Juniper growled. ``Think, Catherine.
His priority is stalling us while he finishes his bridge, he'll pull out
every stone from the defensive line to Hainaut if that's what it
takes.''

``That's just as much of an issue if we split our force into smaller
armies,'' I pointed out. ``They'll have to follow roads as well, if
smaller ones. And we might move quicker, with the Twilight Ways, but
he's got better awareness out on the field. If one of our forces pulls
ahead of the others it'll get surrounded and annihilated.''

Or worse, slaughtered and raised anew. Sure, we could open gates into
the Twilight Ways -- but we could only open so many, and only make them
so large. An army trying to retreat from an active battle would lose
most its numbers to the retreat, assuming it could even pull one of
those in good order. My legionaries and the Lycaonese probably could,
but the Levantines and the Alamans? They were brave and hardy fighters,
I meant not disrespect there, but they weren't \emph{disciplined}.

``You're looking at it from the wrong way,'' Juniper said. ``Going up
the Highway you'll get stuck in one of the natural bottlenecks. The dead
could mass in Lauzon's Hollow-''

It was the name of a natural `pass' leading the highway into the hilly
and rocky highlands of Hainaut, which while not exactly narrow was
steep-sloped and easily defendable. Last year during our offensive we'd
taken the dead by surprise there, smashing the force defending it with a
deep raid of kataphraktoi backed by Named and then held it open long
enough for our army proper to arrive. That trick, though, would not work
twice.

``- or the overpass fortresses at Cigelin,'' she finished.

Fortresses was something of an oversell there. \emph{Les Soeurs de
Cigelin}, or the `Cigelin Sisters', were a pair of large towers
overlooking a dip in the hills the highway passed through. They'd been
built atop very abrupt slopes at the point where the dip was deepest,
one on each side, but the real danger was the chain-gate they commanded.
A massive chain allowed a portcullis of enchanted steel to be raised or
lowered across the road, and while it was hardly an unbreakable obstacle
given enough mages or sappers it would be a costly strongpoint to force.
Last time we'd used the Ways to go past it and then struck the garrisons
holding the towers from the back, after drawing them out, but it'd
slowed us down by at least a sennight. There wouldn't have been
\emph{nearly} as many nasty surprises waiting for us near the capital if
not for that delay.

We'd torn down the fortresses and the chain-gate as we retreated, of
course, but I knew better than to expect not to see them standing again
this summer.

``We need those places under our control, Juniper,'' I pointed out. ``By
the time we get to the capital it'll be filled to the brim with corpses
led by Revenants, which means a siege unless we want to throw away
several dozen thousand soldiers storming the walls.''

And we couldn't have a siege without supply lines to feed our soldiers,
that much went without saying. Julienne's Highway was our best bet at
such a thing.

``You are throwing away your only strategic advantage, superior
mobility, to turn your army into a lumbering battering ram you want to
smash through every gate until you reach Hainaut itself,'' the orc
growled. ``Losing scrying is making you too cautious, Warlord. If you
split your army in three along three lines, the first taking the blue
road towards Luciennerie in the west-''

I kept an eye on her profile in the mirror but the other was on the map
spread out in front of me, displaying northern Procer. Luciennerie was a
minor fortress by size, but it was the key to western Hainaut and more:
holding it would give us control of the blue road when it went further
west into Cleves, and so allow us to anchor our flank to our allies
there.

``- the second marching up Julienne's Highway in the centre and the
third going east by the old mining roads, aimed at Malmedit-''

Malmedit was a city, at least in principle, though even before the war
against Keter it'd been turning into an empty husk. The city had grown
out of multiple mining towns fusing into a single larger one, and lived
off the ore trade, so when the ore had run out the people left for
greener pastures. The Dead King had dug tunnels from further north that
connected to the old mine shafts and he used the city itself as a
staging area, since the lands beyond Malmedit itself weren't really fit
to march an army across. If we took the city, though, we could collapse
the mine shafts and shut the door on Keter's fingers.

``-then all three losses would be severe enough he'll have to commit to
battle,'' I finished with a frown. ``But he won't shy from that,
Juniper. He has the bodies to spare, and he knows that if he defeats
even one of those armies he can turn this entire campaign into a rout by
collapsing that flank.''

If either the eastern or western army was beaten back, the central one
would have to withdraw or see its supply lines cut by raiders. If it was
the central army that was beaten back it'd be even worse, as both other
armies would have to retreat for the same reason.

``So he'll commit forces against all three offensives,'' Juniper said.
``He'll be going after that victory hard, because if he wins it and
finishes the bridge he has a decent change of overrunning as far as
southern Brabant before a defence can even be mounted. And when his
armies are committed, his reserves emptied, then the fourth army -- the
one you kept back, kept quiet -- take the Twilight Ways and hits the
capital directly. While it's been stripped of defences.''

My eyes narrowed as I stared hard at the map. It was a bold plan, it was
true, but then that tended to be Juniper's preference. And the basics of
it held up to scrutiny, I thought. Once the dead committed to the
battles, once they sent their soldiers out, it would not be possible for
them to be recalled in time. They'd have to race across broken terrain,
often without roads, while we cut through with the Twilight Ways. The
army that assaulted the capital would be taking a risk, but if it paid
off\ldots{} We could keep a strong garrison in Hainaut then send forces
to hit the enemy in the back as they tried to hold off the army going up
Julienne's Highway, taking the dead in a pincer. Victories there, which
should ensue swiftly, would open the road to the capital and allow for
supply lines to be established.

Hells, with the dead out west and east stuck defending fixed positions
we might even not suffer too badly from raids on it.

``It could work,'' I admitted. ``And the smaller armies would lessen the
burden on our logistics a great deal. Mind you, that's also thrice as
much supply line to defend.''

``I'd wager they won't even raid, at the start,'' Juniper grunted.
``Keter will want you in deep before striking, it won't want to risk
spooking you. After that, well, that's what you've got all that Alamans
horse for. It sures as Hells isn't to win battles.''

I snorted. The Hellhound's enduring dislike of Proceran light horse
continued to amuse. Especially since she'd several times suggested
Callow acquire its own in the past, should we ever get the means.
Juniper appreciated the value of light cavalry on the field, which was
hardly surprising given her taste for winning by manoeuvre. It was just
that she believed, and I tended to agree with her, that Alamans light
horse was useless against most kinds of undead. Unlike Proceran peasants
the skeletons wouldn't break and flee when charged at, and the riders
just weren't armoured heavily enough to withstand staying in melee long.
As skirmisher, outriders and patrols they were still leagues better than
anything else we had but given how many of them we had I'd have eagerly
traded a few thousand for their equivalent in northern horse.

``It needs refinement,'' I said. ``And I'll need to take it to the other
commanders. But it sounds like the bare bones of a plan.''

We didn't leave it at that, of course: I still had at least two hours
before crippling headaches indisposed the finest general of my
generation, and I intended to use every moment of them.

---

It was another five days until the delegation from Mercantis arrived at
the Arsenal.

I was not part of those who received the six merchants lords led by an
ambassador. Given the amount of gold the crown of Callow still kept in
the city -- from the coin the dwarves had paid me for my\ldots{}
mediation down in the Everdark -- I'd been expected to, and my absence
did not go unremarked. I left them to the First Prince, knowing that as
long as I kept handing her such pretty hooks there were few fish she
would not be able to catch. My hours were spent arranging the upcoming
campaign, consulting both Vivienne and Juniper when I could and then
taking those increasingly refined plans to the regular war council.
Prince Klaus had his own notion of how the campaign ought to be
conducted, but they were not incompatible so steady progress was being
made.

After two days of being ignored, the diplomatic party from Mercantis
realized that I had not the slightest intention of reaching out to them.
They tried to arrange something through Cordelia, who to my great
amusement `declined to interfere in Callowan affairs', so when faced
with that failure they finally took direct steps. It wouldn't be that
easy, though. When the merchants sought an audience with me I passed
them off to my designated heiress Lady Vivienne Dartwick instead as a
calculated insult. They'd walked out of the room as soon as it was
halfway polite to do so, Vivs told me afterwards. Good. I wanted them
angry: anger would dull their edge, and dullards was what I wanted to
deal with. The letter I received from Cordelia that evening was short
and unsigned, but undoubtedly hers.

\emph{They want you at the table}, the First Prince said. \emph{They
want something from you. Anger them further.}

It was heartening to see that these days Hasenbach knew me well enough
not to even doubt my ability to infuriate other people. I was no noble,
and I was hardly a deft hand at the games of those born to that station,
but when it came to giving slights it must be said that I was rather
well learned. I sent a messenger to arrange a meeting with the head of
their delegation, Ambassador Livia -- making sure her name was
misspelled, a detail as petty as it was personally satisfying -- but
sent Lady Henrietta Morley as the Callowan representative. Vivienne's
secretary was known as a lady as a courtesy title, as while she was the
heiress to Harrow she had no lands of her own, and she held no formal
position in my court. I was later told that sheer disbelief that she'd
be snubbed this way had Ambassador Livia stick around for nearly half an
hour before she left in a fury. I received a formal letter of complaint
about my rudeness from the Mercantians, and without missing a beat
responded by handing it over to Archer so that she could do a theatrical
reading of it in the meal hall.

Indrani got a few Alamans priests to sing as a background chorus while
she declaimed it in the style of epic poetry, which I thought was a nice
touch. It was the little pleasures that made life worth living.

I knew Hasenbach had read them prefectly when they \emph{still} tried to
get me in a room after that. Mercantis officially requested an audience
with the high officers of the Grand Alliance, to speak of the large
loans it had extended over the war effort, but to my amusement this time
I didn't even have to do a thing. Lord Yannu flatly refused to have the
matter considered a Grand Alliance one, since neither Levant nor Callow
had taken loans. So what was it that Mercantis wanted from me sorely
enough they'd suffer repeated insults and still try to have talks? The
merchants lords of the City of Bought and Sold were a proud lot, and not
afraid to make their displeasure known when provoked. Whatever it was
they wanted, they mustwant it \emph{very badly}.

The following day I threw in another slight for good measure, requesting
that they be contained to lesser parts of the Arsenal while war councils
were held through the Mirage, and it must have done the trick because
that afternoon I got another letter from Hasenbach. \emph{They want
Cardinal}, it said. \emph{Owned or buried}. It took me, I had to admit,
almost entirely by surprise. But it shouldn't have, looking back. A
neutral city at the crossroads of Calernia, whose neutrality would be
backed by several realms and a treaty binding Named? It was a natural
rival for Mercantis, who would still benefit from the ease of transport
over lake and rivers but lose out in most other regards. Cardinal would
be, to the Consortium, the death knell of their influence.

It would do worse than destroy them, in their eyes: it'd make them just
another of the Free Cities, another squabbling city-state the great
powers would run roughshod over with little consequence.

``Owned or buried,'' Vivienne repeated.

I'd shown her the letter before consigning it to flame.

``Buried begs no explanation,'' I grunted. ``So long as the Red Flower
Vales remain a fortified border instead of a city, Mercantis is still
presumably the main trading partner for Callow.''

Trade with Procer had, even back in the days of the Fairfaxes, never
been widespread. It'd been mostly restrained to luxuries, and even that
much had died after the Conquest when Praes shut down the borders.
Mercantis' days of influence over my home were soon to disappear anyway,
though. Even if Cardinal never saw the light of day, I intended on
seeing peace between Callow and Praes: my homeland's grain would start
heading east instead of downriver, and the need for a middleman starkly
decline.

``Owned is trickier to ascertain,'' Vivienne frowned. ``The land for
Cardinal will have to be ceded by Callow and Procer, so they can't
possibly think to buy it. At a guess, they want control of the trade in
the city.''

I slowly nodded. It made sense. The concessions needed for the
Consortium to have such a stranglehold would probably involve privileges
granted by laws and treaties, which they could not help to secure
without Callow's assent. They had leverage on Procer given how it was in
debt to them -- though thanks to Cordelia's caginess they likely didn't
realize quite how \emph{badly} indebted the Principate was -- but they
had little they could realistically strongarm me with. The Callowan gold
in the vaults had been placed there by the Kingdom Under, so they
couldn't do a thing there without angering the dwarves. That left pretty
much only threats to sabotage the finances of the war effort as a whole.
After all, while the defensive fleet of Mercantis meant it would be hard
to attack militarily the city had so few mercenaries left to call on at
the moment that the thought of it attacking Callow with any degree of
success was laughable.

``So we know what they want,'' I grunted. ``And why, at least in part.
Now we move on to the trickier parts.''

We had their aim and their angle of attack. In a sword fight that would
be enough for any halfway decent blade to settle the match, but
diplomacy was not so clear-cut. Hasenbach would have sweet-talked them
into a degree of trust towards her, by now, since she was good at being
mannerly and they believed they had a knife at her throat. The nature of
this game was that the First Prince just wanted to settle this to
everyone's satisfaction -- but mostly Mercantis' -- while the Black
Queen was just being the worst sort of ruffian. Catherine Foundling,
right? What a wench. Have another cup of wine, ambassador, and tell me
more about what you want so that I might help you get it. No, on the
silk glove side I considered us to be well handled. It was the steel I'd
have to bring to bear, and that was more delicate than you might expect.

Too much steel and you had a fight on your hands, too little and they
shrugged you off. There was an art to it.

``It can't be anything physical or provable,'' I mused. ``Else we'll
have a legitimate diplomatic incident on our hands.''

My being a prick to their diplomats wasn't that, even if they liked to
pretend otherwise. I was in no way obligated to grant them an audience
if I didn't feel like it, though after my slights if the shoe was ever
put on the other foot they'd be perfectly within their rights to
humiliate me just as publicly. Assaulting the diplomats, though, would
be something altogether graver. It'd soil my reputation, Callow's and
push them closer to Malicia.

``Don't forget the Tower will likely have a man or woman in the
diplomatic party,'' Vivienne pointed out.

I didn't bother to say that we couldn't prove that, since even if I had
doubts that Malicia had outright subverted one of the merchant lords
into her service I had no doubts whatsoever that she'd bribed at least
one to spy on her behalf. There was a reason they'd been brought in
through a fake location and kept blindfolded through the translations.
So the enemies to beat here were fear and greed, I thought. Fear of
being left behind by the world that would rise from the fall of Keter,
greed for gold and influence and power over others. I didn't have the
know-how to craft an acceptable settlement deal with Mercantis, but that
wasn't to be my role here anyway: the First Prince would see to that end
of it. My part was forcing the merchant lords to back down from their
ambitions, so that Hasenbach could slide in and offer them that
alternative.

``So it will,'' I murmured back, then shook my head. ``I need to talk to
Masego.''

Vivienne cast me a wary look.

``Why?''

``Because he knows the wards of this place inside out,'' I said.

Including those protecting the diplomatic quarters where our friends
would be sleeping.

``Make it known to the First Prince I'll need a few days,'' I told
Vivienne.

I did not insult her intelligence by specifying this should be done
secretly. It was important that she and I not be seen to be
collaborating, as part of out strategy rested on the appearance of us
being at odds. If I was out of control, Cordelia could not be asked to
prevail upon me with sweet reason. Why, I was trouble for her as well!
I'd wager some of them would suspect something was going on, but the
cordial working relationship between Hasenbach and myself wasn't exactly
public knowledge. And it couldn't be denied that my stint as the Queen
of Winter had left me with a\ldots{} reputation. I was not above using
that, if it came down to it.

``I'll handle it,'' Vivienne said, then cocked her head to the side.

She hesitated.

``Yes?''

``What for?'' she asked. ``The days, I mean.''

I hummed, considering.

``Best you don't know,'' I finally decided.

``That reprehensible?'' she asked, brow rising.

``It's better for the both of us if you keep your hands clean,'' I
patiently said. ``You know that.''

She breathed out, as if gathering patience of her own.

``I know you're trying to smooth the path of succession,'' Vivienne
said, ``but this is getting out of hand, Cat. I don't need to be
protected.''

``A lot of your appeal as a queen will be that you're made of paler
cloth than me,'' I bluntly replied. ``It would be counterproductive for
you to start tainting your reputation.''

``I ran with you for years as the Thief,'' she said. ``That ship has
sailed.''

``You also fought in a rebellion against Praes,'' I pointed out. ``Look,
Vivienne, I didn't pick your name out of a hat. I can trust you to take
care of our home, and I respect your ideals. But we have to be practical
about how this gets done or there's going to be trouble. I'm a warlord
with no real claim to the throne, and you're deriving your legitimacy
from the howling void that is mine. If this is going to hold without a
civil war, you need to be popular enough no one wants to fight you. That
means sometimes you'll have to be distanced from necessary evils so your
reputation stays clean.''

``There's no one else here, Cat,'' Vivienne calmly said. ``For whose
watching gaze are we doing this distancing?''

My irritation mounted.

``If you're not going to be involved, there's no reason for you to
know,'' I said.

``To give advice,'' Vivienne said. ``To provide a second pair of eyes.
To make suggestions. Unless you no longer consider me fit to serve these
purposes.''

``I didn't say that,'' I sharply replied.

``I know,'' she said. ``But you've been using this as a reason to take a
step back from me, Catherine. For some time now.''

That sounded like an accusation, even if she'd tried to make it
otherwise. It was also infuriatingly vague.

``What are you saying, exactly?'' I asked, frowning.

``That it would be natural if it stung,'' Vivienne delicately said,
``that even after all you have done, since the truth about Diabolist has
been known, there are some among our countrymen who would rather see me
reign than-''

My fingers clenched.

``Enough,'' I cut in. ``\emph{Enough.} We are not talking about this.''

She looked at me, and it burned that Vivienne looked not angry but
instead tired and a little sad.

``We will have to, sooner or later,'' she replied.

``I have actual real problems to deal with, Vivienne,'' I told her
through gritted teeth as I rose to my feet. ``Instead of\ldots{}
whatever this is. Handle what I asked you to.''

I didn't wait for an answer. I left the room limping, headed for Masego
and the answers he'd have for me.

It felt like fleeing.
