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

don’t just want intelligence and logistic support and strings pulled and special dispensations. Oh no, that’s just because we’re good friends. They also want me to coordinate an effort to find out what happened to their missing patrols as if this worm-bored backwater couldn’t swallow an entire division with barely a whimper. Wouldn’t be surprised the drunken Bavarian idiots just got lost and will show up in a few weeks, trailing after the rearguard.”

Given that the captain’s sweat stank like it had been distilled, it was more than odd that he would be critical of others' alcohol consumption, but that wasn’t what piqued Milo’s attention.

Missing patrols?

“Missing patrols, sir?” Milo asked, feeling the hairs on his neck pricking up.

Lokkemand squinted at Milo after mopping at his face with a handkerchief.

“Yes,” the captain replied. “A few smaller patrols went missing after the general advance was issued. It’s not unheard of, especially in this rough terrain and with so many men, but when more were sent out and only half returned, I had Bavarians by the bucket demanding I do something.”

Milo supposed it was possible to lose your way in the mountains, but after the revelation in the tunnels, he doubted that was the only thing in play.

“I tried first to just give them search grids to use,” Lokkemand said, nodding at the map, where Milo could see overlapping lines penciled in certain areas. “When they pressed it, I reminded them that technically Nicht-KAT wasn’t military intelligence, and they went whining to the Rider. Epp came strutting in here and made it clear he wants to be close to full strength before pushing on to Kabul.”

“What did he expect you to do?” Milo asked, looking surreptitiously over his shoulder at the collection of typists. Not a crack squad of jaegers, that was for sure.

“How should I know?” Lokkemand huffed, grabbing his chair and dragging it closer before plopping down. “Men like Epp make declarations and expect subordinates to figure it out from there. I’m not saying he isn’t a capable commander, but when it comes down to it, the man is an ass.”

Milo didn’t know if telling Lokkemand about the jelly thing in the tunnels would help the situation, but the germ of an idea was beginning to form. With some finagling, he might take something off the beleaguered captain’s plate and protect Ifreedahm at the same time.

“So, what if the patrols weren’t lost?” Milo asked carefully. “What if they were killed in a treacherous ambush?”

Lokkemand narrowed his eyes at Milo.

“Is that a confession or a question?”

Milo swallowed and tried to keep the nervous flutter in his stomach from affecting his voice.

“A question, sir,” he replied crisply. “If the men were all tragically lost, I assume you couldn’t just give your word that they were dead. What would have to happen for that to take place?”

Lokkemand leaned forward in his chair, a bead of sweat dripping from his nose onto the map below.

“I suppose,” he began gingerly, “I’d need some sort of evidence of their demise. Bodies mostly, along with damaged bits of their kit. Uniforms, broken equipment, and weapons. Even if the enemy took everything serviceable, it would be odd if there wasn’t something left.”

“Of course,” Milo said, nodding to himself. “And you wouldn’t necessarily need to have every soul accounted for. Some might have been taken prisoner or something.”

Lokkemand swiped his face again with his damp handkerchief, nodding very slowly.

“That’s true,” he said, watching Milo warily. “Do you have something in mind, Volkohne?”

Milo met the man’s pointed gaze and felt his stomach do a little flip-flop. Was he really ready to do this?

“Yes, Captain, I might,” Milo said, forcing a smile. “But I’ll need two things.”

Lokkemand was losing the struggle to keep a hopeful look off his features.

“Yes? What?” the captain said a little too quickly.

“I’ll need about a week,” Milo said, watching his commanding officer’s expression closely. “And how quickly can you get me as many dead bodies as possible?”

21

A Complicity

“Impossible,” was Imrah’s response when Milo introduced his plan to her. “Mad and impossible.”

“But you made yours in a matter of hours,” Milo pressed, pointing at her flesh-shrouded figure. “If you teach me how to make skin-suits like that and we had all the materials, we could make half a dozen a day, and with nearly a week, that should be more than enough to cover the majority of bodies.”

The ghul princess snarled and began to pace the common room. Milo’s eyes were burning out of his skull with fatigue, but he’d avoided his bedroll so he could talk to his teacher as soon as she returned from wherever she’d been sulking. The contessa had left with word for the Bashlek to gather the supplies they would need for his scheme.

“Just teach me how to do it, he says,” Imrah muttered to herself as she stalked back and forth. “As if it were that easy. As though he could just pick up what some ghuls never master.”

“Oh, come off it!”

The words had surged out of Milo’s weary mouth before his brain could stop them.

“What?” Imrah hissed, rounding on him.

Milo knew he was supposed to be working on tact and that you caught more flies with honey, but right then, indignation was the only thing keeping him upright.

“Don’t act like you think I can’t learn it, or that you don’t want to give it a shot. For every challenge you’ve put in front of me, I’ve come out on top, from that first fetish in the tunnel to the soul well. I’m not saying it’ll be easy, or that we might not be able to pull it off, but I know if it seems so impossible, you want to give it a shot just to stick it to all those leeches in Ifreedahm, not the least your own father.”

His little rant finished, Milo leaned against the wall to hide the fact that he was winded. Imrah stared at him for a full pained minute, jaw working. Then she gave