Guardian of Heaven and Earth
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New Yogo
Part 2 - Transcending Death
Chapter 3 - Peasants and Thieves
Balsa passed through the Yauru Mountains on a narrow strip of road. She patted her exhausted horse and stopped for a brief halt. She had made good time, but there was no place to change horses in easy reach, so she had to help this one last.
She should be able to see the Tarano Plains once she passed the next mountain. Ten days had passed since the opening battle of the war. She wanted to know where the wounded and survivors had been taken.
As Balsa passed the last mountain ridge before the plains, she gasped and stopped her horse suddenly. It was just past noon, so the Tarano Plains were illuminated brilliantly in spring sunlight. The Blue Bow River, which bordered the battlefield, ran fast and strong with white rapids.
It was almost time for planting. The earth of the plain looked rich and deep, but it was fallow. She was used to seeing the rice fields below the Tohata mountain range being green with new rice plants by now, but that wasn't the case this year. What little grass there was had been trampled down heavily, as if an enormous wild beast had rampaged through the plains at great speed.
Balsa squinted and identified still shadows that lay still on the ground. There was the battlefield. She urged her horse onward and descended onto the plains. Balsa couldn't see very far ahead; the path was winding and overgrown. She crossed over many small streams and animal paths before she found a wider road that cut through the forest bordering the plains.
When she'd come as far as the foot of the Yauru Mountains, the path turned sharply to the right. It was here that she first noticed obvious signs of recent battle. She unfastened her spear in her saddle and gripped it one-handed as she rode.
Rounding the sharp turn, Balsa discovered a wagon that appeared to be full of food. Five men surrounded the wagon with their swords drawn. The terrified people in the wagon screamed, begging their attackers not to steal from them or kill them.
This area was probably a farmstead before the war started. The people inside were undoubtedly farmers, and their attackers were bandits that roamed the area around the Tarano Plains, looting the dead and stealing from survivors.
Balsa kicked her horse lightly in the side and rushed to help the farmers. She approached the bandits from behind, but she made no effort to disguise her approach. When the bandits saw an armed warrior on horseback headed straight for them, they scattered into the woods. There was a pattern on the hilt of the sword of the bandit leader that Balsa thought she recognized, but he fled before she could take a closer look.
Balsa waved her spear aloft, knocking three of the bandits down before they could flee. In an instant, they were knocked out cold at her horse's feet.
Balsa pulled up on her horse's reins in front of the wagon and looked around. She peered into the woods and chased down the two remaining bandits. She brought her spearhead to the jaw of the fourth bandit smacked him down. He also lost consciousness, hands twitching toward his bleeding face. She caught up to the bandit leader and attacked, knocking him out as she had the first three. Then she returned to the wagon.
The three men in the wagon peered at Balsa curiously.
"You should probably get moving again before they come to," Balsa said. "They won't wake up for a while, but you'll want to be far from this place when they do."
The men nodded mutely. They were still shaking as they got their horses ready to move the cart. When they were almost out of sight, a young man called out to Balsa, "Thank you! For saving us!"
"You're welcome!" she called back. "Just be safe!"
The young man stopped the cart. "We should at least pay you something," he said when Balsa approached again.
"I don't need money," she said. "I'm looking for someone who was in the battle ten days ago. If you're from around here, could you tell me what happened? I have no idea where to even begin searching."
"Sure, we're from around here," the young man said. "We'll tell you everything we can." An old man and another man poked their heads out of the wagon and nodded.
"I thought we were in real trouble for a minute there," the old man said. "I'm relieved that there are people like you on the road. There are a lot of people like us shipping supplies from place to place at the moment--and a lot of bandits and thieves, too."
"It seems like you're transporting food," Balsa said. "Where are you headed?"
The young man looked down. "The Talsh army camp," he said.
"The Talsh army camp?" Balsa was shocked. "Is the Talsh army still camped on the Tarano Plains?"
"They are," the old man said. "They marched up the imperial highway before the battle, and more men keep arriving at the camp, day by day. They have their camp near the mountains in a place called Susono. They pay well for any food that's brought to them. New Yogo's army needs food, too, but they don't pay."
The old man frowned. "And you know, it's odd. I thought the Talsh were foreigners, but the ones I've seen look just like us. I heard that they were all people-eating monsters and demons, but that's not true at all."
"They also pay quite a bit for news," the young man said, "especially from the south. We've made enough to recover most of our war losses by trading with the Talsh."
Balsa listened silently, withholding judgment because she still needed more information. Besides, the men of the Talsh army were likely just as blameless as the men of New Yogo's army for the war, and no one deserved to starve to death. No one deserved to lose their homes to war, either. Balsa understood the motives of the Talsh army and this family perfectly.
It was lucky that no one in this family had been drafted. If one of their brothers or their father had died on the battlefield, Balsa doubted the survivors would be willing to sell food to the Talsh. When Balsa asked them as much, they frowned at her.
"Do you hate us, then?" the old man asked. "You're a warrior; do you want to kill us for aiding the Talsh?" He shook his head. "You can, but it won't make no difference. There's an ocean of them up at that camp, and more keep coming. If they wanted to, they could wipe us all out before we could blink. They could steal our food and take our horses like New Yogo's army did. They could take everything, but they don't. They buy everything at generous prices. Our parents and children eat well every day and are safe."
"We're much better off than we were," the young man said. "We used to work all day in the fields for the army and the Mikado, without getting paid except with enough food to keep us working. This is much better for all of us."
"Don't insult the Mikado," the old man hissed. "The heavens are watching." Apparently, he was a believer in Yogo's god, Ten no Kami, who could strike people dead with lightning.
"Don't be silly, uncle," the young man said. "If Ten no Kami is watching, then I'm sure he understands exactly how we feel. I'm sure my old man would say the same thing." He turned toward Balsa. "Though it was hard to get food for a little while after."
"After?" Balsa asked.
"The battle, I mean. There were so many corpses that they hired help to bury them. My older brother was drafted, so I went down to the Tarano Plains to look for him after the fighting was all over.
"It was...horrible." The young man shuddered. "You couldn't tell our side from their side. We buried so many, but there was no end to the corpses. I hope that whoever you're looking for isn't there."
"Were there any survivors at all?" Balsa asked. "What happened to them?"
The young man snorted through his nose. "Not sure, but I heard that New Yogo's army retreated north to Yazuno from here. All the survivors who could walk went with them."
"And what about the men who couldn't walk?" Balsa asked.
The young man frowned. "I heard that they put them on rafts and floated them to the southern villages. It probably would have been kinder to kill them outright. I passed through the marsh not too long ago, and it was also full of corpses. I expect they all died within a day or two of being abandoned."
Balsa felt the world around her recede. "Some of them must have survived," she breathed. "They must have. Where are the survivors?"
"Are you looking for a soldier?"
Balsa nodded. "He comes from one of the northern Yakoo villages originally."
The two men exchanged glances. "Sorry to say this, miss, but you should probably give up searching. I doubt he's alive. Even if he survived the battle and was injured, he's in the south, which is full of Talsh soldiers. If he's not in the southern villages or the fortress to the north, then he's dead."
Balsa's face fell. The young man said, "You can travel with us for a while, if you like. There's a place in the Talsh army camp where some of New Yogo's wounded are. I can lead you there."
"That's not where we're headed," the older man said.
"I'll take her on my own, uncle," the younger man said. "You can go on home with the cart. We owe her for saving us from those bandits."
The young man and the old man looked at one another for a few moments, but eventually, the old man nodded. "Take care. And come back safely," he said.
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