“We were here first!”

Coranobis grinned and gestured at Harun with his long gun, undisciplined and dangerous if it were loaded. Which it likely was. His handsome, confident face glowed in a way that said he knew other men envied him. Blue eyes hid halfway under cool, sleepy lids made everything he did look effortless. His black curls hung haphazardly over a square forehead.

Coran’s men, a section of fifteen or twenty leather-clad soldiers with long guns and sabres, laughed in camaraderie and turned away from Harun’s approaching men to the view from the overlook. Beyond the dark green trees of summer, the pale fielded valley stretched westward to the wooded wall of another long mountain under a clear, blue sky. Enemy territory. The Shenandoah Kingdom.

There was very little to be learned about the Kingdom from the overlook, even with binoculars. But, the Blue Ridge belonged to Orange and the Orange Company patrolled it.

Harun felt his lieutenant’s hand on his shoulder as they walked up with their men behind them.

“Let it go, Captain. Don’t let your heat boil over. They took the empty trail. We had to restock camps on the way.”

Harun nodded, but he felt that heat rising in his chest. Coranobis turned with his men to look out over the Kingdom. He held a hand out casually, and one of his lieutenants gave him an antique set of binoculars.

“He’s an embarrassment to the Orange Company,” Harun hissed at his lieutenant.

“Sir, we all agree. Hell, some of his own men agree.”

Harun turned with questions on his face.

“Oh yes,” the lieutenant said. “After the skirmish with Albemarle, his men were skiffed.”

Skiffed was Tidewater slang. It meant they were angry and considered sneaking off. As if in a skiff, rowing away from a tyrannous captain or an unjust port.

Lieutenant Severide was a Tidewater man who had married into the Orange family, but had brought the Tidewater slang with him. Harun himself was an Orange man by birth, descended from the leading family at Beauty House. Severide was his brother-in-law, while Coranobis had married his cousin.

Coranobis was a Nova man. As Severide brought Tidewater slang, Coranobis had brought the ambition of Nova with him. Harun would have preferred a Shenandoah husband for the cousin Coran married, an open enemy rather than a duplicitous Novan. Severide, on the other hand, was a good match for an Orange lady. A foreigner, mouth full of foreign words, but his heart was with Orange.

Tidewater men were loyal. Being skiffed was a big thing for them.

Then there was Coran’s skirmish with Albemarle, an ally of Orange. Captain Coranobis had his men raid an Albemarle storehouse, looking for goods he could sell on the black market, but a section of the Albemarle militia showed up at a most inconvenient moment. Everyone knew these facts, but Coranobis insisted his section was just visiting the storehouse to make sure it was secure when the militia mistakenly attacked them. Albemarle was not strong, they needed Orange as an ally, and the elders of Orange had decided to accept an Albemarle “apology” to end the impending conflict, with no consequences for Coranobis.

Four of Coran’s men had died in the skirmish, and two of the allied men. Harun could fully believe some of Coran’s men were skiffed about that.

“Well,” Harun said to his lieutenant, “they stuck with him anyway. And, here they are at the overlook before us, laughing alongside their captain.”

Severide gestured toward a patch of grass, poking up through the asphalt gravel of the overlook. The stems were bent, in places broken. Someone had been there before all of them.

Harun looked up into his lieutenant’s face, having seen the same clues. Severide nodded his head at Coranobis and his men, staring out over the valley in the bare sky heat of summer. Harun took the hint. Play with the loyalty of Coran’s men.

Harun raised his hand to stop his own men and turned back to them.

“Take a rest, take a drink.”

They nodded and started settling in, putting their long guns on the ground, taking out canteens and salted meat.

“Captain Coranobis,” Harun said.

He and Severide walked up to Coran and his men, who had turned to glare at them. Harun adjusted his long gun’s strap on his shoulder.

“Captain Harun,” Coranobis said with a sleepy eyed smirk.

Harun chuckled at the man’s hubris.

“Did you see the grass, when you showed up first?”

Coranobis glanced at his men, then glared at Harun.

“The grass? There’s grass all over the place. It’s taken over all the old roads.”

Harun slung the long gun from his shoulder aggressively, chuckled at Coran’s grimace, and used the gun to gesture at the bent grass Severide had noticed.

“That grass.”

Coranobis and his men squinted at the stretch of the overlook Harun had pointed out. Some of the men nodded in a sudden recognition.

“That grass,” Harun said, “shows that the Shenandoans were here recently. They pitched tents. They walked around. They likely used a fire bowl to cook to keep from leaving ashes in the gravel.”

Severide pointed. “The grass was pulled out right there. Probably to keep it from getting burned by the fire bowl.”

Coran’s men slumped their shoulders. Some of them turned back to the the valley. Some of them stared at the bent grass, looking for more clues. The rest of them glared at their captain. Those were the skiffed men, Harun knew.

Captain Coranobis stomped over to Harun. Harun glanced at Severide to signal him to step away. Let Coranobis feel free to say whatever he wanted, without a witness. Let him act the fool. Severide tried to stare the captain down, but then nodded and retreated to the men.

“So easy,” Coranobis said, “to notice this as you slunk up behind us.”

“We haven’t had it easy. We were carrying supplies for the trail cabins. You came up the short path, unencumbered.”

“We came up the steeper path. And we had to watch for wild folk.”

“So did we,” Harun said. “Did you engage any?”

Coran pressed his lips together.

“We saw sign. But, we moved on and arrived first.”

Harun nodded. He enjoyed the angry red in the man’s face. He’d broke the man’s cool.

“You were first but you missed the whole point of these patrols. We’re not here to notice wild folk sign or peer out at our enemy’s farms. We’re here to make sure the Shenandoans are not violating the truce by coming up to our ridge.”

Coran grunted and shook his head. He glanced back at his men. Too many of them were intently watching the exchange. Skiffed men. Coranobis snapped back to Harun, his lips tight.

“I suppose you’ll be bragging about this to Jeddy Ridvan and the rest of the elders.”

“The Blue Ridge,” Harun said, “is ours. Ours to patrol, ours to defend. It belongs to Orange. The Shenandoans should not be here and that was our mission. In fulfilling our mission, my men were first.”

Coran huffed and grinned.

“You’re so good at patrolling and defending, right?”

Harun felt the heat rise in his chest again. Coran was shifting toward something more personal. Harun suspected he knew what, but it was not yet clear in the air. He could not find words to respond.

“Your wife. Marina.” Coran leaned close. “Her borders are also open to incursions?”

Harun dropped his gun and grabbed the man’s coat.

“Captain!” came Severide’s voice. Harun heard his men stepping forward behind him.

Coranobis tried to pry the man free, but Harun’s thick fingers did not move. The two men stared at each other with bared teeth.

Harun heard none of Coran’s men speak up. They were simply standing, watching, waiting to see what happened.

He released Coranobis with a shove and pointed at him.

“Your incursions have long been noted,” he growled. “And, I am proud to say, rebuffed without need of my response.”

Coran brushed his coat straight. He managed a cool smirk. Harun turned to his dropped gun, but Severide had already picked it up. Harun took it, slung it over his shoulder, and turned his back on Coranobis.

“Investigate the evidence of the Shenandoah camp and write up a report.”

“Yes, captain.”

“Send Craven and Futzhall to scout down the Shenandoah side of the ridge.”

“Yes, captain.” Severide turned and nodded the two men down the hillside.

“And,” Harun said, turning to his section, “you men start setting up our own camp outside where the king’s men were. Watch for clues.”

Harun glanced over his shoulder. Coranobis shook his head in anger, then turned to his men.

“Get moving up the road,” he grunted. “North. We’ll continue our patrol and engage any foreign forces we find.”

“Men,” Harun shouted to his section. “Honor our brothers.”

They snapped to attention, turned to Coran’s section, and shouted in unison: “For the Orange!”

Coran’s men turned and snapped to attention. “For the Orange!”

Coranobis himself just glared at Harun. He was a dangerous man to have as an enemy. Harun wondered how moral it would be to pray Coran would be snatched by the wild folk. Some of them were rumored to be cannibals, insofar as the genetically modified could still be considered humans and thus subject to condemnation as cannibals. Many considered the wild folk more animal than human.

As Coran’s section marched off up the ridge road, Harun noted Severide driving a flagpost into the earth just beyond the asphalt gravel. A man stood nearby holding a folded flag, an orange field with a green crescent moon, a green star, and a green, dotted T for the Truslow family who ruled from Beauty House. Harun’s own family.

Coran’s men disappeared into the woods up the ridge road.

As the flag was attached to the pole, Harun called his men to attention. Severide slowly tugged the flag up the pole as the men sang the song once known as the Star-Spangled Banner, but now known simply as the Anthem.

All of the lands Harun knew of claimed the Anthem as their own. Orange, the Albemarle Republic, Fredericksburg, Nova, the Tidewater Confederacy, Greater Columbia, the Roanoke League, and even the Shenandoah Kingdom. It was a nostalgic throwback to the day before The Package was released over a century ago, when all of the lands were part of the unimaginably vast United States.

“…and the home of the brave,” the men sang.

“Captain!”

Harun and Severide turned to the valley, where Craven and Futzhall stood panting at the head of the downhill trail. Their long guns were lazy in their hands, aiming all around.

“Secure your weapons,” Severide said.

The two soldiers snapped to attention, guns against their shoulders.

“Report,” said Harun.

“Captain,” said Craven, “there’s something down-trail you’ll want to see.”

Harun turned to Severide.

“That was quick.”

“It’s close, sir,” said Futzhall.

Harun shrugged at Severide and nodded toward the two scouts. The lieutenant shrugged back and turned to the men.

“Finish setting up camp. The captain and I are going to have a look at what Craven and Futzhall found.”

The four of them walked down the trail from the overlook, through a gap in the rocks.

“What is it?” Severide said.

Futzhall looked back at him.

“I’m not sure we can explain.”

The trail descended past green trees, green bushes, and mossy rocks. Holly speckled the edges of the path with hard, spiny leaves. The rocks to either side reached upward until the trail leveled off in a wooded terrace, strewn with camp goods. Tents, fire bowls, packs. Everything but guns and swords.

Also, a dozen or so headless bodies in Shenandoah uniforms.

Craven and Futzhall turned and stopped just short of the bodies. Harun and Severide marched past them and spun around.

The rocks formed a wall blocking the way uphill, a single crevice marking the trail they had taken from the overlook. To either side of the crevice, stakes rose from the forest floor. Atop each stake was the head of a man, blue in death, mouths agape.

“What the fuck,” said Severide.

“The flag,” said Craven.

Attached to one of the stakes was a flag. It was smeared with red clay, but underneath could be seen the black of the Shenandoah.

“That’s the kingdom’s flag,” Harun said.

“Those are the king’s men who camped at the overlook,” Severide said.

Futzhall stepped up to flag, grabbed its corner, and extended it. In the red clay smear were drawn three symbols, as if with a finger. A crescent, and star, and the letter T.

Harun looked at the ground, put his hand on his face. He looked up and pointed at the defaced flag.

“That’s meant to signify Orange. This,” he waved his hands around to take in the whole scene, “is a warning to Shenandoah not to rise to the ridge along this trail.”

Craven and Futzhall nodded, nervously.

“But,” Severide said, “who did this?”

Harun shrugged. Futzhall dropped the flag.

“The Burnt Shack,” said Craven.

“No,” said Harun, his voice betraying a slow boil. “The Burnt Shack insurgents are white racialists like the Shenandoans. They’d never champion the Orange.”

“The Burnt Shack are Old Christians,” Futzhall said. “The Kingdom is heathen. Could be a religious thing.”

Harun nodded. The Shenandoans were white racialists, but also Nordic pagans and the Burnt Shack would find cause against that. But Orange was nominally Muslim, although all faiths were encouraged. And Orange was racially mixed. The Burnt Shack movement hated that.

“The Burnt Shack would never champion the Orange,” Harun repeated. “We’re Muslim and mixed.”

The other three men nodded in acceptance.

“Then, who?” Severide said.

Harun rubbed his stubbled chin.

“Either some rogue element of Orange,” he said. “But, I don’t know of any rogue elements.”

The other three men focused on him.

“Or?” said Futzhall.

“Or,” Harun said, “the wild folk did this.”

Severide took a step back and shook his head.

“But why?”

“I don’t know,” said Harun. “But, they’re the least absurd option.”

Craven and Futzhall stared up at the heads of the murdered Shenandoans.

“Maybe,” Craven said, “they want to stop the Kingdom’s incursions into their lands.”

Harun considered it. He felt an epiphany boiling to the surface.

“They just don’t want conflict in the hills.”

Severide considered it, and nodded.

“This,” Futzhall said, waving to the severed heads, “seems a bit extreme.”

Harun huffed a poorly stifled laugh.

“It gets the message across, though.”

“Captain,” Craven said, pointing at the wall of rock.

On a flat surface, between two cracks, a pair of intersecting triangles formed a star in blood. Likely, Shenandoan blood.

“Cumber Six,” Severide said. A leader among the wild folk, a ramkin as old as Jeddy Ridvan. A survivor from the United Times.

“So,” Harun said, “they wanted to make sure the Shenandoans knew this wasn’t us.”