Chapter 102: Chapter 102: Returning With More Than He Left With

“Errm… Jason, is it me or that is more men than the lord left with?” One of the guards asked his companion as they stood on the walls of Mapjess looking at the approaching army in the distance. 

“I may not be educated either but that does not look like 100 men.” As the army came closer they saw just how much bigger it was, several times over at least. They had seen their Lord’s army as it had left Kirton via Mapjess on the way to the north for war, and it looked nothing like what they were seeing at now.

“Well, shit, do you recognise the Lord’s banner there?” As their minds were jogged they started doing what they were supposed to be doing when seeing a large and unknown army marching on the city.

“It’s too far to tell. You keep watch, I’ll go and tell people.” One of them stayed on the walls to keep watch of the approaching army as the other took off running as fast as he could to alert their superiors. The same thing playing out at several points across the walls as the lookouts saw the massive force approaching.

“Woah, where are you going in such a hurry?” As he was rushing down from the walls, Jason almost ran into somebody. When he heard the voice he stopped still, it was one of the voices that he had quickly learnt to memorise lest he ruin his chances of promotion in the future.

“Sir Harvey! There is a large army approaching the town, they are too far away to recognise any banners.” The soldier quickly paid his respects, knowing that even if Roan Harvey was not his superior officer, he still held enough influence with the lord to not offend him. Even if that was not the case, it would not be wise to offend a knight in the lord’s service anyway

“Ah, I should have thought about passing the message to Corban. There is no need to worry, I received word from Sir Kelly the other day that the lord would be returning with the King’s army. You can tell your fellows to stand down.” When he heard that an army was approaching, instead of getting worried, Roan more looked like he was ready to get busy.

And he would be, with Nela and Colin in Cliforge, he would be the highest ranked person in Mapjess. It would be his job to greet anyone of importance should they arrive. And now the King was arriving. If there was anyone who counted as important the King would be him. Not to mention that he would not want to make it look like Braydon could not manage his lands in front of the King.

“Yes, Sir” The soldier was relieved that it was not an enemy, if it had been, there was no way that they could have won against a force much larger than the garrison of Mapjess.

“Hmm, seems like I will have to quickly organise a welcome with Corban. Good thing I remembered to tell Karim about this in advance. Corban will probably be much happier to organise a formal welcome than a doomed siege defence too.” Roan said to himself with a chuckle as he watched the soldier return to his station. He knew that Corban would have heard about the large unknown army by now and was likely not feeling too good at the prospects of facing it. He had remembered to tell Karim because that was the entire reason for him being in Mapjess instead of having already left to manage the border.

---

“I suppose that I should welcome you to my land, your majesty.” Braydon said as they drew closer to Mapjess. They had really been in his land for at least the past two hours, but it was meaningless to say ‘welcome to my land before they actually reached their destination. And here the destination was.

“I shall thank you for your hospitality in advance, though will your people have had time to prepare for so many of us arriving?” King Aled asked, worried that it would not endear Braydon with the rest of their faction, let alone the lords they were trying to get on side, if he was not prepared.

“Rhydian already sent word ahead of us. Even if I am not able to give the same welcome that I would have if there had only been a few people, it should be satisfactory. Well, as satisfactory as a town near the border can be. Though I think the troops may have to stay outside of the walls.” Braydon was not as worried, he did not really care much for the impression of other nobles. So long as it did not actively work against him, it was good enough. He was even happy enough to joke a bit as well, there was no way that he was ever expected to house the army within the town walls. There would simply not be enough room even if they vacated every resident in Mapjess.

“Then that should be good enough, though are you sure that there will be enough room for all the nobles? There are quite a number of Barons with us, let alone those who will be joining us.” The King was not too worried about the Barons complaining about being put up in an inn, but if they were forced to camp outside of the walls then it might have been a bit more of a problem.

“Mapjess might have gotten more merchant traffic than it did before but it has not been that long since I took over. It is not hard to fully book a couple of inns in my own town.” As they were talking, they had made their way to one of the town gates, which had been cleared of traffic as  soon as Corban had been told of their arrival.

Instead, there were two rows of garrison soldiers standing by the sides of the road clearly meant to be there to greet them. At the front was Corban, Sir Roan and Karim, who stood a few steps behind them. Braydon had a satisfied look on his face, they had not let him down after the past few minutes of bragging that they would manage.

“We should probably let the men start making camp. If we tried to take them into the city, I am sure that my garrison captain would lose it.” Braydon suggested, looking back at the imposing force behind them.

“Then shall we carry on?” The king looked at one of his knights who immediately shouted orders for the men to start setting up camp before turning back to look at the lords that were with them.