The Jongurian Mission Read Online Free

companies at the Battle of Baden. Halam had thought he couldn’t see anything worse than his three years at Bindao, but those three days outside the Adjurian capital proved him wrong. He tried not to think about Baden either, but the images of the battle came to him unbidden in his sleep still. Those memories would never be shaken.
    It was there that Trun finally suffered the injury that he ’d been so lucky to escape all those years along the Baishur River. Leading a charge into the unprotected flank of the Oschem-led wing of the Regidian army, Trun’s horse had been impaled by an enemy lance. When the beast reared up, Trun was thrown to the ground, whereupon his horse fell over on top of him. It was just bad luck that a rock was under his right knee when the beast fell. The knee was shattered, but ironically the injury probably saved his life. Unable to get up, and with the now dead horse blocking him from the sight of the rallying enemy army, Trun was overlooked as his company was slaughtered in a devastating countercharge. He’d always blamed himself for what happened to his men that day, and probably still does , Halam thought.
    “ If I was only able to get up and have the men see me,” he always said afterward, “the day would have been different. The Battle of Baden would have been over in two days, not three.”
    Halam himself had commanded a company at Baden, but whereas Trun’s had met with devastation, Halam’s had enjoyed triumph. For it was Halam that had rallied the men fleeing from Trun’s company and enabled them to make a stand at a position on the field which proved critical for the next days offensive, an offensive which won the battle for the Culdovian army. While Halam was wreathed in the cheering adulation of royal nobles and common soldiers, Trun had lain in a sick tent listening to a doctor tell him he’d never walk again.
    It was for Halam’s rally at Baden that he was given the government post in Tillatia, while Trun had no choice but to head back to the family farm and learn to walk again. There were a lot of men in his position in those days when the country was coming off of two wars. Many were in worse shape than Trun, and he knew it. He wasn’t one to complain, and it was less than a year before he was back in the fields, although much slower and unable to do the same heavy work as before.
    Bryn came into the room and jolted the two men from their reveries.
    “That sure is a good horse you got there, Uncle Halam,” he said as he put the flask of milk down on the table and headed to the stove to retrieve three cups. “Judging from the eyes and teeth, as well as the sheen of her coat, I’d have to guess she’s right out of the nobles’ stables in Plowdon.”
    “ Well, you’re right that she comes from the stables in Plowdon, but I sure wouldn’t say there’s anything noble about them,” Halam replied as he grabbed the flask and began pouring the milk into the cups Bryn had set on the table.
    “ I reckon if we had just one horse like that, Uncle Trun,” Bryn said as he settled himself into the remaining chair at the table, “we’d have no need to do any planting at all this spring. I think a horse like that would bring in more than the price of our grain for an entire season.”
    “ Nonsense, Bryn,” Trun replied, looking sternly at his nephew, but also letting his gaze fall upon Halam. “Who’s having that kind of money around here these days? You know well enough how poor-off most of the folk around Eston are. Many have been hit harder than us, and have had to sell-off far more livestock than we have just to get by, and barely at that, I might add. I’d count my lucky stars each night, if I were you, and be thankful for what we’ve got right here.”
    “ Yes sir,” Bryn said meekly, bowing his head at the tough rebuke.
    A few moments of silence passed before Trun spoke up. “Well, brother, you say you’ve not come out to run us off our land or to even lend a