Witchmarked (World's First Wizard Book 1) by Aaron Schneider (my reading book .txt) 📕

but there were no regular gunboat patrols, and attacks from British-friendly locals were not unheard of. The 33rd elected to disembark at the bend where the river rounded the edge of the Band-i Turkistans, a craggy range of low mountains that Ambrose promised were only a shadow of the things to come.

From there, it had been marching across the barely passable, barely habitable lands that were lashed by unrelenting winds as they made for Bamyan. Despite having a vague notion that this part of the world was sun-scorched, Milo found he was thankful for the sturdy greatcoat as they trudged along. In his old colonial rags, he would have been scoured raw and shivering, but as it stood, he only had to deal with perpetual fatigue and the monotony of trudging onward.

As the days stretched on, Milo began to wonder if anyone lived in the desolate place, but Ambrose and conversations he gleaned from eavesdropping assured him that there was more to this place than met his unfamiliar eye. Milo remained suspicious of any human life besides their own until in the distance, he spied what looked like a child tending a flock of rangy goats.

Milo had watched the little shepherd scamper up a scruffy hillock, half-heartedly corralling the beasts in his haste. As more of the herd scattered, Milo wondered at the child’s poor tending until he caught a clear glimpse of the youth, who cast sharp looks over his shoulder at their company.

It was only then that Milo noted a squad of men had detached themselves from the marching order and were heading toward the shepherd and his flock. Rifles in hand, they loped across the rough terrain like dark-pelted wolves from some parable.

“Seems like a lot of work for a little goat,” Milo observed, squinting at a small kid skipping spryly across a boulder. “I’d be more worried about getting lost among all these god-forsaken hills and valleys.”

Ambrose paused, shielded his eyes from the pale glare of the sun, and tracked the progress of the pursuers.

“They’re not going to catch him,” he said at last, catching up with a quick scuttle. “And it’s not the meat they want but the boy.”

Milo jerked his head around so quickly his labor-stiffened neck gave a pop.

“What do you mean?” he asked, pitching his voice low.

All the terrible things one heard about orphanages were not true of most such institutions, but the Dresden Krieg-Waisenhaus was not most institutions. As such, Milo was never shocked but always on guard against the depredations of wicked men.

“Not that,” Ambrose muttered as though reading Milo’s thoughts, though he seemed to take no joy in the dismissal.

“Then what?” Milo pressed.

Ambrose cast a look around the hills flanking the column and then assessed the column itself.

“The officers in the 33rd are not fools,” he answered in his low rumble. “That boy’s going to scamper off to whatever village or band is lurking around these parts. From there, any man with a gun or a rock and a love of British coin is going to descend on us like flies on a corpse.”

Milo felt an itch between his shoulder blades and forced himself not to do his own fearful scan of the hills.

“We’ll be ready, then?” Milo asked, throwing a surreptitious glance at the men in the column around them. “If they know it’s coming.”

Ambrose shook his head, his voice still barely above a conspiratorial whisper.

“We’re stretched out across a few kilometers at least, and tightening things up is going to slow us down. You’ll see more sentries, maybe a few more recon patrols, but any bandit-turned-mercenary is going to know how to hide in these hills.”

Milo didn’t bother to suppress a shudder as the itch became an icy claw racing up his spine.

“So, we’re going to be ambushed?”

Ambrose nodded.

“Several times, unless we’re incredibly lucky or unlucky,” he said, chewing his lip. “They’re opportunists, little better than scavengers, so they aren’t going to be doing anything more than taking a few shots before skittering off to do it again.”

“What are they going to do?” Milo asked, nodding at where the senior officers rode in growling Land Rovers commandeered from the British.

“Do?” the big man asked, seeming shocked by the question. “I know you’re young, Magus, but I thought you were trained as a soldier.”

Milo blushed, hating himself for it, then shrugged in an attempt to seem unflappable.

“The training of a penal regiment is hardly exhaustive.” He laughed, a tart, biting sound the wind snatched away. “March, fight, and die in that order, over and over. Didn’t take things like tactical appraisals into consideration.”

The bodyguard gave a concessionary nod as he nodded toward the setting sun.

“Maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow night, but once things get dark, we’ll see the fighting and dying part, mark my words.”

Milo sighed.

“At least that might spare us some of the marching.”

The first attack came on the second night after the shepherd escaped.

Milo had just managed to convince himself that the attack wasn’t coming, despite Ambrose standing guard for the second night in a row. Their position was more defensible than the trench of a valley they’d been in the night before, being a broad, level patch in front of a craggy hillock. The 33rd had placed two concentric rings of sentry posts around the camp, and the rattling hum of generators powering massive searchlights seemed a comforting din.

Unfortunately, the lights only served as excellent initial targets.

The first went out with a snap, and it was a full two seconds before the crack of the rifle was heard—a long shot by a good marksman.

The rest of the camp hadn’t woken to the danger, and Milo was still blinking when Ambrose hauled him out of the tent.

“What?” Milo slurred, his feet scrabbling on the hard ground as he was half-dragged, half-carried. “Wh-where are we going!?!”

Lokkemand had them bunk down in the center of the camp, which seemed a simple if cold calculation to put as many of the 33rd between them and the enemy as