Premonition of an Encounter

After the 〈Alliance of Four Kings〉 was concluded, the four moved on to discuss strategy and tactics against Mūzeg.

The four shared a single conviction at the level of basic posture: we must strike first.

Hasim's reason for that conviction was different from the others'. The three kings shared not only the conclusion but the rationale.

"If we don't blunt Mūzeg's momentum here, in due course we won't be able to lay a finger on them."

The moment the what if Mūzeg turns and counter-attacks hypothetical landed, the three kings settled.

The hypothetical landed because the present moment was, in their reading, the watershed. Whether they fought or surrendered — the call had to be made here.

Hasim's interior was, somewhat, different.

Hasim needed to move to save the Demon Lords. Surrender was not on his table; he had to move forward, end of conversation.

The coup. The 〈Alliance of Four Kings〉. Both had to land. Failure on either meant ruin.

And he had to make even saving the Demon Lords look as though it had been pre-arranged. The lie he had told Crisca — they are already dispatched, in hand — could not be allowed to read as the bluff it actually was.

Hasim, paying close attention to every micro-cue, drove the four-king discussion forward.

---

The dense council finally wrapped at dusk.

Hasim couldn't remain in Zuria longer. He left a designated liaison-retainer (one he had prearranged in town) at Crisca's castle, with her permission, and made for Lemuse proper.

This time he was leaving via the front gate, face concealed.

"Glad we don't have to crawl back through that dust-choked corridor on the way out, at least."

"Truly."

— Aisha, with a sigh, beside him.

As they cleared the castle, a man slipped through the crowd toward them. Dressed as a Zuria commoner — but the meticulously kept beard immediately gave him away to the two of them.

"— Hasim-sama."

"Sorry to keep you, Reynald."

Earl Reynald.

He had come with Hasim to Zuria and waited in town while Hasim used the less than orthodox route to enter the castle. The waiting had been agony. He had been informed, via one of Aisha's spies, that the entry had succeeded — the storm in his chest had downgraded to a chop — but until he saw them with his own eyes he could not, fully, settle.

He had been pretending to read the city paper at a tea-shop terrace within sight of the castle gate, drinking — at this point he had honestly lost count — and finally caught the two figures emerging. He paid the keeper with an over-large tip in apology for the long stay and walked over briskly.

"Sorry. Took longer than I'd hoped."

"Not at all. I had a report from one of Lady Aisha's friends that you'd cleanly entered. I was relieved enough — though, mind you, I have lost count of the cups of tea I drank waiting."

"Hah. I'll write it up as a state expense in due course."

A small sideways glance at Aisha — thorough as ever — and a wry tease.

"In the meantime — Hasim-sama. There's something I need you to hear, immediately."

"Hm?"

Reynald's pleased expression was already retreating; his collar squared up.

A subtle stiffening in the older man's face. Hasim caught it. He aligned his own posture and pushed the council-fatigue out of his head.

"Something happened."

"The matter of the Demon Lords."

Reynald glanced around, made sure no one was within earshot.

"We've found them. — But —"

Finally, Hasim was about to think — and he caught the but and braced.

"They're moving faster than I projected. They've already left the 〈Duchy of Neuce Gauss〉, and they're on a south-leaning detour toward Lemuse."

"That's exactly the route I would have wanted. There had been some uncertainty about whether they'd take the Three Kingdoms route or come straight to Lemuse — south-from-Neuce-Gauss confirms Lemuse. — Ideal."

He had wanted to add the wind is with us. But Reynald's face said there was more, so he held the optimism.

"— And? What's the worry?"

A grave nod.

"…At the same time — a battalion has moved out of Mūzeg's homeland. The report came in by messenger bird; given the time-lag, Mūzeg is likely already a fair distance into the move."

"— I see."

Hasim's eyes widened slightly. Not, in the strict sense, surprise.

"…So the Demon Lords' speed becomes a problem in that sense, too. I see. I see."

He stroked his chin with his thumb. A few low growls of thought.

"I'd already factored in additional Mūzeg units coming out of the homeland. Once Serius spotted the party at Lindholm, he'd have ordered a search-line laid. This is presumably the result of that. — And — the chance that the Demon Lords reach Lemuse before Mūzeg's units?"

"I don't know. That much I can't say."

"As expected. — Forgive me, Reynald. Mean question."

Information has lag. Without an all-seeing eye in the sky, news travels by bird and horse and takes time.

Hasim had been compensating for the lag with arithmetic, but arithmetic was always a forecast.

He had locked himself in his rooms without sleep or meals, run pattern after pattern with the considerable head he had — and forecasts can still be wrong.

The negative weight inside Reynald's much faster than projected was the weight of the model under-shot the Demon Lords' speed.

"South-detour, then."

He turned the picture over.

"— If they go too far south, that's its own problem."

The detour was, plainly, an avoidance line on Mūzeg's pursuit — sweep around, away from Mūzeg.

But it was also an arc away from the Three Kingdoms.

"If that detour cleanly takes them through Mūzeg's reach, I have nothing to complain about—"

If it worked as intended, perfect. The Lemuse-bound confirmation was a real positive on top.

If, however, Mūzeg slipped a unit into the corridor between the Demon Lords and Lemuse — engagement opens.

Hasim had foreseen that as one of the branching outcomes. The 〈Alliance of Four Kings〉 was, in part, insurance for exactly that scenario.

But — in that scenario, the Demon Lords' speed becomes the problem.

"Overly competent in the wrong axis, frankly."

If the Demon Lords are too fast, the reinforcements from the Three Kingdoms — which are dispatched after the engagement-location is reported — may not arrive in time.

That assumed Mūzeg's pace was correspondingly fast and that they could insert themselves between the Demon Lords and Lemuse. If both held, there was no time for Hasim's group to deliberate.

Engagement on contact.

"In that case — the engagement-site becomes critical…"

The location of the Three Kingdoms' army at the time of engagement.

The distance from there to the engagement.

The chance of running into a separate Mūzeg unit en route.

When you spread that out, the south-detour route looked like a small dark seed of trouble.

Personally, too — Hasim would prefer to not engage anywhere close to Lemuse. Civilians taking the spillover was unacceptable.

"…While we're at it — could we make contact with the Demon Lords ourselves?"

He had picked up from Reynald's phrasing that no contact had been made yet. Possibly the field was holding for the commander's call, but offering coordination shouldn't be a negative for the Demon Lords' situation.

— a shadow crossed Reynald's face.

"As to that…"

A troubled, half-resigned expression.

Hasim tilted his head and waited.

"Um. There is a 〈Land Dragon〉 with them…"

"…"

Hasim and Aisha frowned in the same beat.

Aisha's face recovered to neutral quickly, but a wisp of unease remained.

Hasim's frown stayed; he sighed, larger this time.

"…Hh. So that's why my arithmetic was off. Using a land dragon as transport was not on my projection list…"

"Right…"

No common forecaster could have predicted that, he added internally, and let out another snort.

"In which case — I'd guess: your spotters got eyes on them, then were left in the dust."

"Exactly. — In an instant.

"We had a sharp-eyed observer on station, and all our scouts had been briefed with the Lindholm-event details, which is what allowed the team on the ground to identify the group as the Demon Lord party at all. But to your other point — contact itself was…"

A weary, small note of understood in Hasim's chest.

"…Damn it. I'd very much like to track those Demon Lords down and call them idiots to their faces. They went above forecast in the worst axis."

A wry exhalation.

Reynald wiped sweat with his cloth and nodded.

"— Hh. — All right. Better than nothing. We've at least confirmed Lemuse-bound. Faster than projected is enough information, combined with the sighted point, to narrow the position envelope considerably. If contact has to be me personally, so be it. I'll make do."

A hand-flick. Back to face.

"For form's sake — they aren't all on the dragon, are they?"

"No, no. If they were, I'd be more flustered."

A small joke of his own. Then, with a beard-shake and a serious face, the rest:

"— There are also several swift horses. Apparently the horses are unburdened — all the cargo's been loaded on the dragon — so the horses are running properly fast. …With some real distance between the dragon and the horses."

"Naturally. Horses fear dragons. — They aren't using the dragon as a whip from behind on the horses, are they."

A quick joke of his own. He moved back on point.

"Anyway. The speed itself is the operative fact."

He started walking. The major report had landed — the rest could be done in motion.

Reynald and Aisha matched his pace through Zuria's streets.

"That said — the Demon Lord party has unusually quick logistics. Connections in Neuce Gauss? — Plus the funding angle. The 〈Alchemy King〉 line is the suspect of choice. That family was a major merchant house in old days; the run of fame was broken a few generations back by a bad call from one of them, but —"

A loose hypothesis.

"If the current 〈Alchemy King〉 has inherited that blood, he may well be back to major-merchant status under an alias. — Money-grubbers are persistent across eras. Half-hearted money-grubbers ruin themselves easily, but past a certain threshold of commitment, they get extremely difficult to dislodge."

"As you say."

"— Mm."

Even mid-irony, Hasim was running calculations behind it.

He stopped — about twenty steps in.

"— No. Wait. I have a bad feeling. …That land dragon reminded me of something."

The topic snapped back. Neither Reynald nor Aisha objected; Hasim's face had gone tight.

"A while back. I was drinking incognito at a bar in Lemuse's capital — I overheard a rumour. About land dragons."

It would have been easy to dismiss as drunk-talk. That he had retained a chance overhearing from a noisy public place at all was, in itself, slightly unusual. But Hasim had retained it, and he wasn't dismissing it now.

"The rumour was: a sparse land-dragon group sighted west of the Three Kingdoms."

"Sparse?"

"Yes. Land dragons are highly social. Their groupings hold tight; the group sizes default to large. Sparse sticks out."

He couldn't reconstruct why sparse. But it had been quietly sitting in him, a small unease.

He pivoted on his heel and started walking back toward the castle. An abrupt about-turn.

"Better safe than sorry. I'm going back to push Muran and the rest to move. Reynald — tell our spies near Mūzeg that some of them are to remain in position. The dispatched battalion is concerning, yes, but there's no guarantee something stranger doesn't follow it. Make sure the instruction includes: don't be drawn entirely onto the battalion. Flashy moves like that battalion are, in this era, frequently diversions. By the time we see the diversion-shape, the information may be too late, but we still need eyes on it."

While giving the orders, his eyes were on the ground. He wasn't blinking.

Or rather — he wasn't really seeing the ground. He was running every nerve into thought.

"Sir. As you command."

"Good. I trust you."

Reynald turned and walked off briskly. He had picked up the act now meaning under Hasim's words, and was already on it. Reynald's quality showed in moments like this.

Aisha, beside Hasim, watched with concern, hand at her chin, and waited. Without intruding, without letting her worried eyes broadcast the worry, she stood quietly at his side.

After a while, Hasim came back.

He pulled his eyes off the ground, sent a glance to the sky, watched the clouds drift for several seconds, and turned to Aisha.

A gentle small smile on his face.

"— Right. The Demon Lords' movements concern me. But before all that, let's pray they don't meet Mūzeg in the worst possible place at the worst possible time."

However tightly one runs one's predictions, the moment another mind is the agent, the prediction can be exceeded.

If only one could put one's hand on every will, Hasim thought —

"Truly. Things never quite go to plan. — Such is the world, I suppose."

— and didn't doubt that that was the world's nature.

―――

――

―