[July 3, 298 AC | Early Morning | Westeros > Banks of the Green Fork > First Supply Patrol Battalion] “Where’d this stray dog come from?” The bare-chested veteran sat on the grain sack, picking his teeth with a rusty dagger.
The moment the words left his mouth, lazy laughter rippled through several campfires.
Soren stood in the middle of the mud, unruffled.
“What’s your name?” The veteran spat out his grass stem and bared a row of yellowed teeth.
“Cliff.
Deputy Commander of the First Supply Patrol Battalion.” He put heavy emphasis on “Deputy Commander,” as if reminding Soren who actually ruled this mud hole.
A rough soldier missing half an ear looped behind Soren, reaching out to grab the reins of his gaunt horse.
“Hard journey, Commander!
Leave the horse to us,” he sneered, laughing mockingly.
“As for a tent, there are plenty of empty grain wagons—pick one that doesn’t leak to sleep in.” A few camp followers snickered behind wagon wheels.
Someone stretched his feet toward the campfire, deliberately pretending he hadn’t heard Soren’s assembly order.
Cliff bounded off the grain bag and sauntered up to Soren.
“Listen good, pretty boy.
In this mud pit, only the words of Lord Lefford and Lord Crakehall count as military orders.
If you want to stay alive here for a few days, keep your hands off the ledgers, off the grain sacks, and off my men.” “By military law, he does have an official commission,” a young voice chimed in from the side.
The speaker was a boy of seventeen or eighteen wearing worn leather armor, with a faded badger coat of arms sewn on his chest.
His face retained a touch of youthful greenness, but his eyes were sharp and clear.
Cliff gave him a side-eye.
“Roland Leyton, no one asked for your mouth.” The youth pressed his lips together without backing down.
“I’m only reminding you, Cliff.
If he really is the commander sent from the main host, what you’re doing right now is enough to earn you the lash.” “The lash?” Cliff sneered.
“That’s assuming anyone here dares to swing it for him.” Another round of low chuckles echoed nearby.
Soren threw a glance at the boy.
Roland Leyton.
A distant scion of House Leyton, a minor noble dumped into the baggage train to pad his service record.
Unlike the domineering Cliff or the numb camp followers, this lad was clear-headed.
Such a person might not be blindly loyal, but he understood rules—and he understood fear.
Cliff was already extending a calloused, heavy hand to shove Soren’s chest.
“I said, what kind of piece of shit do you think—” Soren didn’t draw his sword.
Once steel cleared sheath, the matter would be framed as “New Commander Slaughters Subordinates.” Tywin wouldn’t care about the truth; Lord Crakehall and the quartermaster would only rejoice at having found a pretext to eliminate him.
So he couldn’t draw a sword.
At least not today.
Just as Cliff’s palm was about to touch his chest, Soren’s right hand shot toward the nearby fire pit.
Beside the black pot lay a poker as thick as a duck’s egg, its tip still glowing with embers.
Soren snatched the staff and flipped his wrist.
[Temporary Trait: Stick Fighting – Novice (White) triggered.] No flashy flourishes.
Just raw, direct, agonizing force.
*Crack!* The wooden stick swung in a sharp arc, slamming right across Cliff’s reaching wrist.
The sneer on Cliff’s face twisted instantly into anguish.
Before a scream could leave his throat, Soren stepped forward, whipping the stick downward behind Cliff’s right knee.
Cliff’s knee buckled, and he dropped into the foul mud with a squelching thud.
The surrounding rogues finally snapped to attention, roaring as they reached for their hilts.
Soren didn’t even glance at them.
He jabbed the butt of the stick straight into Cliff’s lower flank, beneath his ribs.
“Urgh!” Cliff’s scream strangled in his gullet.
The blow wasn’t lethal, but it was enough to buckle him into a shrimp, vomiting sour bile and stale ale onto the mud.
Soren retracted the pole and delivered a swift backhand strike.
The stick grazed Cliff’s ear and buried itself into an adjacent grain sack.
With a sharp tear, the burlap split open, spilling moldy oats everywhere.
Cliff writhed against the filthy ground, twitching, completely unable to utter a coherent word.
Only then did Soren raise his head.
The few thugs who had grabbed their hilts froze in their tracks.
They had seen ruthless men before, but they had never seen someone handle a brute like Cliff—turning him into a dying fish with nothing more than a firewood poker, without even unsheathing a blade.
Holding the heavy stick with one hand, Soren felt the sudden movement strain his old injury; a dull throb radiated deep from his ribs.
He endured it.
A Constitution stat of 21 kept this recently patched-up body from collapsing on the spot.
“I got hurt yesterday,” Soren said, his tone quiet, yet it silenced every laugh around the campfires.
“My temper isn’t great.” He walked over to Cliff and planted a boot firmly on his face, squeezing mud around his cheeks.
“Now…
do I qualify as something to you?” No one answered.
Soren fixed his gaze on the half-eared soldier who had led his horse away.
“The horse.” The half-eared soldier paled, immediately letting go of the reins and leading the horse straight back.
Soren looked over the crowd again.
“First Supply Patrol Battalion, fall in!” This time, the camp finally moved.
Veterans grumbled as they stood up.
Wounded men hobbled onto the open ground on crude crutches.
Camp followers shoved each other into lines.
One fellow was half a second slow; Soren merely cast a glance his way, and the man scrambled frantically into line.
The ranks were as crooked as a dog-gnawed fence.
But at least they were standing.
Roland Leyton was the first to step to the side of the formation, whispering low: “On the left are the wagon guards, on the right are the draftees, and behind are the wounded and replacements.
The scribe is behind the third wagon—he keeps the ledgers.” Soren glanced at him.
“You know quite a bit.” Roland offered a bitter smile.
“My father sent me here hoping I’d learn how to sustain an army.
But after three months, all I’ve learned is how to tell moldy wheat from even moldier wheat.” Soren shoved the firewood poker into the mud.
“Scribe.” A middle-aged man thin as a reed squeezed out from behind the wagon.
Wearing a lopsided felt cap and clutching several ledgers in his arms, his face was as pale as if he’d just dug his way out of a grave.
“I…
I am here, my lord.” “Bring the ledgers into the tent.” The scribe swallowed hard.
“Which one?” Soren stared at him.
“Start with the one you least want me to see.” The scribe’s face turned even paler.
Roland Leyton dropped his head, almost breaking into a laugh before stifling it with effort.
…
A quarter of an hour later.
Inside the dilapidated commander’s tent, the light was dim.
A thick parchment ledger rested on the desk, emitting a rancid stench of aged grease, stale ink, and mold.
Soren sat in the camp’s lone wooden chair.
Outside, Cliff was bound to a hitching post with a rag stuffed in his mouth, still groaning in pain.
The soldiers outside remained lined up in three ranks; none dared drift away.
The scribe stood before the desk, his fingers trembling uncontrollably.
Roland Leyton waited by the tent flap, watchful and cautious, offering no unsolicited words.
“Your name?” “Gawen, my lord.” “How long have you kept the books?” “Three years.” “Then you should know very well who made these entries.” Cold sweat broke out on Gawen’s forehead.
“It’s all kept according to the rules, my lord.
Lord Lefford’s quartermaster verifies them regularly, and Lord Crakehall also…” “Did I ask you that?” Gawen shut his mouth instantly.
Soren opened the ledger.
He possessed no specific trait that instantly handed him answers.
But an Intelligence stat of 23 caused those jumbled numbers, dates, seals, and inventory descriptions to align in his eyes like straightened threads.
At first, they were mere scattered strands.
Soon, however, they wove together into a clear web.
Soren flipped through several pages, his finger pausing on a line of ink.
“The Battle of the Green Fork.” Gawen’s throat bobbed.
Soren read further.
“The First Supply Patrol Battalion did not enter the front line, did not participate in any charge, and engaged no enemy forces.” The tent fell so silent that only Cliff’s stifled groans outside could be heard.
Roland Leyton’s expression shifted as well, as though he had guessed what Soren was looking at.
Soren raised his eyes to meet Gawen’s.
“And yet it states here that in yesterday’s battle, the patrol battalion reported a loss of fifty heavy draft horses.” All color drained instantly from Gawen’s face.