***(Author’s commentary)*** Okay, I admit it, I almost cried when I wrote the end of this chapter. The touching scene between Princess Hildy and the little messenger boy just moved me. I think also that the parallels between our world during the World War Two era, and this made up world, are becoming more apparent. The kingdom of Smilingman now stands alone against the evil empire and the conquered kingdoms, much as England did against the rising Nazi tide… and they don’t even have an America to call upon for help.

So, just imagine that Hildy, a 17-year-old princess, is Eisenhower… and the crazy old blind and deaf queen is Churchill… and substitute spears and slings for machine guns and artillery… and there you have it.

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The Seven Kingdoms

Chapter 20

Hildy and Lawry walked together, back up the road towards the castle. The rest of the command staff stayed at headquarters to begin getting things in order. Sanara was already hard at work, watching the troops who had been equipped with slings. The rest of the staff were trying to figure out how best to balance increasing the size of the army without decreasing the amount of food being produced. More camps would be needed, and they had already figured out that putting them in the farm fields, although they offered a nice, flat area in which to train and house large numbers of men, was counterproductive. They had the men moving their tents out of the fields and onto the verges of the valley and even under the trees. The soldiers could take some time off from training to plant, tend and harvest crops. Princess Zar, along with the triplets, was going to go on a tour of all the manufacturing installations, to get an idea of how the tents and armor and weapons and uniforms were being made, and to see if it would be possible to increase the speed at which they were being produced.

They stopped at the top of the hill, looking back at the scurrying clusters of orange-clad troops. “They certainly are colorful, aren’t they?” Lawry observed.

“I was just thinking the same thing,” Hildy replied, smiling at her friend. “I had been toying with the idea of getting some dyes, and splashing splotches of the colors of all the kingdoms on everybody’s uniforms. We would look like an army of rainbows, but I thought it would show that we are all in this together. But now I am thinking back to right after the battle of Evergreen, when we were wandering through the woods, gathering up the survivors. The Evergreen soldiers in their green uniforms were hard to spot in the woods.”

Lawry saw immediately where this was going. “Yes, we all need green uniforms!”

“Yes, exactly right,” Hildy said, excited by this idea. “Because I don’t plan to fight the Skulls in big lines in open fields any more than I have to. I foresee ambushes and raids and hit-and-run attacks. So it would be better to be able to blend in. I am putting you in charge of finding all the green dye you can, and figuring out how to make more. We are going to need a lot of it.”

“Oh, we can use different shades of green dye, make the uniforms splotchy, just like you were talking about, but they will look like leaves in shade and shadow. We will be like walking bushes!” Lawry was positively aglow with excitement.

“I knew you were the person for this job,” Hildy said with a laugh. “It is your artistic nature. And you always did like clothes.” They turned and continued their walk to the port. They found a boat to row them out to the Wavebounder. Before they had even finished climbing up to and over the rail, the Caster brothers were shouting excitedly down at them.

“We had the best idea,” bellowed Tolly.

“It was my idea,” yelled Tull.

“Well, he got it because of me,” roared Tolly.

“You can both stop yelling in my face,” Hildy said quietly, from where she hung just below the railing, her head only a short distance from theirs.

“We were training with the spears, just like you told us to,” Tull said to her, reaching out to help her over the rail.

“And I can’t beat him often, because he is bigger than me,” broke in Tolly, helping Lawry aboard. “So I pretended to throw my spear at him.”

“And then I remembered when we were little,” Tull continued, “before our dad let us go out on the boat with him. We used to fish near shore by throwing small, pointed sticks. We would split the ends of the sticks with a knife, and carve little barbs on the points. We tied strings to the sticks so we could pull the fish back to us when we stuck them.”

“You know our spears are too big and heavy to throw well, and even if we did, then we wouldn’t have them to fight with anymore,” Tolly tried to explain.

Tull wasn’t giving him the chance. “But the slings are sort of hard to use when you are close to other people. You have to spread out. And they are really bad for using on the ships, with all the ropes and masts and so little room.”

Tolly leaped back into the verbal onslaught once again. “And in the woods, with branches and bushes and things, or in narrow city streets, little spears would be better.”

Tull sent his next volley. “Each of us could carry three or four little metal-tipped, barbed spears, and use them when the enemy is close, like when they charge us, or right before we charge them.”

Tolly finished off the barrage. “They might not kill anybody most of the time, being light, but imagine having one stuck in you. You wouldn’t want to fight anymore. You would have to stop and pull it out. And the barbs would make that really hard to do.”

Hildy just shook her head and smiled broadly at these two boys who had been the very first recruits in her army. “I think this is the best idea the two of you have ever had. I am making you both captains, and putting you in charge of the throwing spears. Gather up your gear and get ready to come with us back to headquarters.”

The two boys ran excitedly off to do just that. Captain Reef approached, nodding his greeting to the princesses. He, too, had much to tell. “I have had all the ship’s captains row over so we could begin to discuss things. I hope you don’t mind, but I sent most of the sailors from our original fleet off to the other ships, and had sailors from those ships replace them in case we need to sail. Our sailors are now fairly well trained with spear and sling, so I thought they should begin passing those skills on to the rest of your fleet.”

Hildy thanked him profusely for his forethought.

The captain continued. “I sent the local fishing boats out deeper than they usually go. They are to act as our scouts, to give us early warning of any approaching ships. They will still be able to bring us back some fish to help feed that army of yours.”

Hildy just smiled and nodded, happy to have this man at her side.

“I also sent a crew of carpenters from the ships ashore to gather lumber, tools, and more men, to construct two wood and earthen forts on the headlands on either side of the mouth of the bay. And we may want to think about moving the fleet to another bay on the far side of the kingdom. We could defend this bay, if it comes to that, especially once the forts are built. We don’t want to end up penned in here, but on the other hand, if the first fleet the enemy sends at us isn’t too big, this might be the perfect spot to lure them into an ambush.”

Hildy felt a tear come to her eye, and briefly but firmly hugged this man that she had known and trusted since she was a child. The captain hugged her back, and she was only a little surprised to see a tear glint in his eye as they broke apart. She told him to send all the soldiers they had brought with them ashore, to help train the army that was camped there, and to send the Skull prince who was being held prisoner on the ship to the castle to be locked up.

“It might be better to leave him here as a bargaining piece, in case we end up getting cornered,” the captain suggested.

Hildy smiled at him again. “Whatever the commander of the fleet thinks is best.”

The newly-promoted commander winked at her. “One last thing, princess,” he said seriously. “Tell Sanara this. Fire is the enemy of all ships. I’m sure she will know what to do with that message.”

A short while later, Hildy and Lawry, along with the Caster brothers and Arch Storm, the Skull spear fighting expert, were on their way back to the war camps. The rest of the day passed by in a blur. The soldiers they had brought with them to Smilingman arrived and were spread out amongst the camps, and some were sent off to the new camps that were springing up around the kingdom, bearing the orders to move the camps off the farm fields, even if it required them to clear new ground or move some distance. Arch Storm would act as a roving trainer, wandering through the camps, giving advice and fine-tuning the fighting skills of the men.

At dinner that night, Hildy passed on the captain’s message about fire to Sanara as soon as she came into the kitchen. The farm girl perked up immediately, and Hildy thought she saw fire in the girl’s eyes. Sanara mumbled something about the baskets she used to weave when she was very small, and ran off without eating more than a few bites. The Caster brothers, after setting up a pair of small tents for themselves in the yard by the headquarters complex, had disappeared for most of the day. As Hildy finished her meal, they burst into the room.

“We’ve been talking to the local soldiers, finding men who know about trees and wood,” began Tolly.

“Turns out that the smaller branches on the same trees we use to make the staves are perfect for the throwing spears,” added Tull.

“They are at the very top of the trees,” Tolly said gravely.

“It is really scary to climb way up there,” admitted Tull.

Hildy began to lecture them about safety, but Tolly just gave her a big, lopsided grin and held up a hand. “We only did it once. The men showed us how to use ropes to secure ourselves. Now we have about twenty of them getting all the branches they can find.”

Hildy felt herself relax a little.

“We are going to start making some spears to test tomorrow,” Tull informed her. “We will go into town and find a blacksmith to help us make some barbed tips.”

The brothers went off to get some food, and at that moment, a messenger arrived from the castle. “Princess,” the young boy stammered, “I have word from princess Zareena and…” the boy paused, unable to remember the names of the triplets, but gamely gathered himself and plunged ahead, “… the three sister princesses. They asked me to tell you that they went to all the places where things are being made, and then they sent out word to gather a lot of women and children and old men, to take over making slings and to help with a lot of the other work, and that a lot of men will be coming to the camp tomorrow because they don’t need to work anymore. Also, the princesses are sleeping in the castle tonight, and tomorrow they are going on a ship to visit all the other towns and do the same things there, and they might be gone for a week or more.”

Hildy thanked the boy, and asked him if he would like some food. He said he would, and smiled shyly at her. By the time he had eaten, it was dark outside, and she asked if his parents would worry about him if he spent the night on the couch by the fire.

“No, my Lady,” the boy said in a low voice. “I have no parents. That is why the queen lets me sleep in the kitchen in the castle.”

Hildy hugged the child, and set him up with a comfortable nest of blankets and pillows. She tucked him in, nice and snug.

The boy looked up at her, his eyes already looking as if they were growing heavy. “I am going to help make slings, starting tomorrow, when the queen doesn’t need me to take messages,” he told her in a sleepy voice. “When I am older, I will learn how to make spear points from the blacksmiths. And when I am big enough, I want to join the army and fight by your side.”

Hildy hugged him again, and whispered in his ear. “You would make a fine, brave soldier, but I hope the war is over before you need to prove it.”

Then she went into her room and closed the door, so no one would see her cry.