Rewrite That Witch
CH201 · Rewrite
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Chapter 201: Back to the Stronghold

The pills made the pursuit simple.

Roland held the First Army back until the rout was well established and the pill-enhanced speed had burned itself down to its opposite — the compound’s withdrawal leaving the militia’s legs with less than they’d had before they took the first dose. Within two kilometers, the fastest runners had thrown themselves on the ground and could not rise. The First Army gathered them methodically, walking where their targets had sprinted, and began the long walk back to Longsong Stronghold.

Total First Army casualties: five. All from spears. All four of the artillery casualties had been to lateral throws, the flat-arc technique that had found the shooting slots at close range. One infantry soldier, Freckle, had taken the throw Roland had watched from the platform. All five survived. Nana had moved through the field with Sir Pine before the battle was officially over, treating in priority order, beginning at the artillery positions because she’d heard the outcome from that direction before any report arrived.

Roland watched her leave the field under cheers and salutes from the soldiers she had passed and thought: six months ago she fainted at blood. He did not know exactly what that meant as a data point about human capability, but he filed it under things worth preserving.

Four days of marching to return to Longsong Stronghold. Two captured knights who had, once the pills wore off, sat quietly on their horses and answered every question put to them and asked only about the terms of ransom.

The stronghold’s remaining garrison crumbled faster than the assault force had. Nightingale went ahead with a small team, walked directly into the castle through the service approach, and made four minutes of conversation that ended with the garrison captain dead and the hundred-odd militiamen running for the nearest gate into an ambush the First Army had already set up outside it.

Roland found Petrov in a basement cell. He looked like a man who had spent three days determining whether anxiety could be fatal and had not yet arrived at a conclusion. He did not appear to have been struck.

“Your Highness.” Petrov crossed the cell and clasped his hands. The relief on his face was the unselfconscious kind — the kind that could not be performed on short notice. “I didn’t know the envoy —”

“They’re dead,” Roland said. “Most of the fifteen hundred they brought are dead as well. The rest are locked in your prison.”

Petrov absorbed this in the way that careful men absorbed unexpected information: completely, without visible reaction, until the full shape of it had resolved. Then: “Your Highness, with this — your brother will see you as a thorn.”

“Was the alternative to lose on purpose and beg for his mercy in King’s City?”

Petrov’s eyes went briefly to the floor. “No, Your Highness.”

“When he sent soldiers across my border, he became my enemy,” Roland said. Not anger — just the form of a thing. “The moment I give him the next twenty years to consolidate, I lose everything I’ve built.”

He sat down and told Petrov what he was going to need.

First: an army. Not knights — a standing civilian force, three hundred people selected from the stronghold’s population. Age sixteen to thirty. No criminal record. Not Church followers. No physical disability. Roland would provide weapons and training. The Honeysuckle family’s knights and patrols would handle urban security; the garrison would handle defense. “The selection criteria are on this parchment,” he said. “I’ll review every person you put forward. Do not try to insert agents.”

“Your Highness, I already tried that and they’re in your mines —”

“I know. And if it happens again, the next conversation will be more formal.” Roland said it without emphasis, which was the only kind of emphasis it needed.

Second: education. Border Town’s primary education system was coming to Longsong Stronghold. Every resident under forty, men and women. Reading, writing, calculation, natural knowledge, ideological education. The cost would come out of the tax rate — Roland was reducing the stronghold’s contribution from thirty percent to twenty for the first year, with the remaining ten as a dedicated education fund. City Hall staff were coming from Border Town with textbooks and teaching protocols. Petrov’s examination: fifty percent population literacy within one year.

“Most nobles in the stronghold have no experience teaching serfs,” Petrov said.

“I know. That’s why I’m sending my people. They’ll train yours.”

Third: the road. A proper road between Longsong and Border Town — wide enough for two carriages side by side, flat and straight, fully surfaced, passable in all weather.

Petrov’s face arranged itself into the expression of a man working out whether the cost was a conversation or a refusal. “Five thousand gold royals for macadam, at minimum.”

“The stronghold provides the workforce. I provide the materials and pay the workers six silver royals a month. Post recruitment notices across the Western Territory.”

Six silver royals. Petrov did not say what he was thinking, which was that six silver was a craftsman’s wage and this was laborer’s work. What he said was: “How many?”

“Two thousand to start.”

Petrov nodded slowly. This was the nod of someone who had decided to trust before understanding and was working backward from the trust to find the logic.

Roland told him about the church — the burned building, the dead high priest — and the pill he placed on the table between them. “Write to Hermes that Timothy’s envoy did this. You found the pill near the building afterward. They will understand what it implies.”

“I understand,” Petrov said, pocketing it.

“Good. Now go to work, Mr. Ambassador.”

On Little Town, heading back upriver, Nightingale appeared at Roland’s shoulder and looked at the water with him.

“You seem quiet,” she said.

“The civilians.” He was watching the Redwater move. “Timothy used them as weapons. Pointed them at a wall and lit the fuse.”

“That wasn’t your fault.”

“Of course not,” he said, and meant it. “If I hadn’t stopped them, Border Town is gone. The Church made the pills. Timothy bought them. The logic of the situation is clear.” A pause. “It still costs something to think about.”

Nightingale reached over and took his arm in both hands — not comfort, something steadier than that. The gesture she made when she wanted him to know she was there without making a ceremony of it.

“That’s why you’re going to wreck the Church,” she said. “So people stop killing each other for reasons like this.”

“That’s the promise,” he said.

He felt her nod against his shoulder.

Then let’s keep it.

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