| |
An hour had passed and SilverFox had finished working on translating the enemy cipher to the Grand Reach’s cipher. He was now in his monastic robes, a rope was tied at his waist with the twelve knots that represented the amount of years he had spent in the monastery. His robe was purple, which was the colour of a senior’s robe and also meant that he had taken certain vows that he was impelled not to break.
A monk started with the rank of zero and the status of Accolade or what is better known as an initiate. An initiate is one who had not declared any vows and the colour of their robe was red, which happened to be the colour of the robe that he had given Captain Greenwood to wear. It was appropriate considering that a senior monk always had an initiate monk at his side. Every three years a monk went up one rank and took on another vow.
SilverFox was rank four when he had left and took on four vows. Even though he was no longer a friar in the eyes of the other monks, he was still bound by the laws of the brotherhood of the warrior monks called Robes of Justice. Once a monk reached the rank of nine, which meant that they were a monk for a minimum of twenty-seven years and took on nine vows, they would become an elder of the Robes of Justice.
Only one monk could hold the rank of nine, which made them the leader and high monk. The vows that a monk would have to take in order of rank from rank one to rank nine was Loyalty, Law, Brotherhood, Justice, Peace, Love, Chastity, Faithfulness and Priest. SilverFox was sworn to uphold the first four vows. Robes of Justice were the only monks allowed to use edged weapons.
Not much, if anything, was known of the other monasteries. All that was known was the names of a few orders, the weapons that they used and the general philosophy that they lived by. It was estimated that there was at least fifty different orders in the kingdom, of which only four were known.
The Robes of Justice were the most well known of those four orders and the other three that were not so popular were the Crimson Tigers, the Tree Frogs and the Vicious Wolves. All three were sworn enemies of the Robes of Justice and this also made them enemies of the Grand Reach. Hopefully, SilverFox and his men would reach his father with the translated ciphers.
SilverFox slipped a piece of parchment into the folds of his robe and then placed a rolled up piece of parchment into a scroll case and the scroll case into his message satchel. He was ready and he hoped that his men would also be ready. Just as he was done, his two captains, two heavy lancers, two horse archers and the four sergeants had arrived.
“Now that we are all here, we can discuss and formulate our plans. Come follow me,”
Said SilverFox, slipping his saddlebag with the message satchel in it over his shoulder.
He escorted them into an area of his tent that was more suited to the planning of this ruse that they were going to pull on the enemy. It was also the place where strategies and tactics were usually discussed. After everyone was seated he continued speaking,
“Most of the plan about our departure has been discussed, except for the odd case that any of us is captured.”
He handed everyone a rough looking piece of parchment that had strange writings on each of them and resumed,
“In the unfortunate event that you are captured you are to inconspicuously drop this parchment so that it can be noticed as a mistake on your part. You are to quickly attempt to recover it.
“It is written in the enemy cipher and should throw them in the wrong direction. Each parchment is different and each location will put the enemy into a compromising position that will give us the advantage of an ambush.
“If you can help it, don’t get caught because it will most likely result in death depending on which enemy commander is leading the capturing forces. It is already known that we are leaving at dusk, which is in about three hours.
“Make sure you get a little rest, not sleep, but rest. If you sleep you will be sluggish going down the road and that would be the death of you. We want everyone to be ready to fight if the need arises, but we will not go out of our way to wage a pitched battle.
“Not only that we don’t have the time for a stretched out battle or even a small one, we cannot afford to lose anyone on the road and we cannot afford to lose the message that I must get to our king. Until we are in the company of the king, we must act and respond as we are supposed to according to our given roles.
“Now to the duties of our sergeants and our elite commands. The elite commands will be split into four command units, which will give us two heavy lancer units and two horse archer units.”
SilverFox brought a blank piece of parchment and set it on the table. He drew two rough elliptical structures and one large elliptical structure directly across from them. Making a straight line between them and two arrows from the two smaller structures, he began to explain to them of how they were a representation of the two units of horse archers.
Those two units were to shoot volleys of arrows followed by a bombardment of crossbow bolts. He then continued to explain the plan.
“While the horse archers let arrows and bolts fly into the enemy, the heavy lancers will go on either side of the enemy like so,” Silver-Fox drew two more elliptical structures so that they sandwiched the larger elliptical object and continued his instructions.
“Timing has to be perfect in this operation, any slip-ups and some of our men could go down from a stray arrow or a bolt, even if it goes as planned do not be surprised about any casualties because there will be some.
“Our horse archers are to distract the enemy long enough for our heavy lancers to get into place. Once they are in their proper positions, the arrows and bolts are to cease and the horse archers are to draw their weapons. They are to close in on the enemy.
“At the same time that the horse archers begin to close in on the enemy, the heavy lancers are to charge into the enemy’s flanks. I know that you are going to say that their back is not covered, but there is a small river behind them.
“This means that you should be able to crush the enemy and get out of there before their reported reinforcements arrive. Once this is done you are to head in our direction because it could be possible that we might end up running into those reinforcements.
“On the other hand, they could be coming from the other side. The attack on the enemy should be done at the same time that we leave to deliver the message to the king. That way we are sure not to be noticed by the enemy as we leave the compound.
“You sergeants take these plans and study them. Once you are done with them and committed them to memory, burn them. We cannot have our plans falling into enemy hands.
“If, at any time, either one of you suspect that your plans have been compromised you are to alter your plans according to the situation at hand. That is the very reason you are to study these plans and make contingencies for the unknown factor of the allies joining the battle.
“Strategize and formalize what could go wrong when confronting the enemy thinking of possible changes to the plan to get the same outcome. Your outcome should be constant and that constant is to push the enemy into the river giving them no escape from the slaughter placed upon them. You also should theorize what you should do if their reinforcements arrive on time.”
After the sergeants had left the tent SilverFox discussed more of their plans, their formation and the way that they would leave the compound. They would go around the back of the tents in the compound away from the border between them and their enemy with SilverFox and Captain Greenwood in the lead.