#oc lina

He stares, with too much focus, at the papers splayed across his desk. He would have to submit the rough final plan in the morning, to share with the troops so they could adequately train. As soon as the sun kissed their temporary camp, he would only be able to make minute changes. The weight of each life depending on this fight, each soldier and each peasant and all others of the kingdom, sit dead on his soldiers.

In the morning, the weight will shift some, onto the troops. But for now, they rest on him alone.

His plans would be the reason for victory or failure -- if they lose and the kingdom burns in blood, it rests on him. He trails the nail of his little finger along one of the plans, following a troop's covert path to flank the enemy.

His incisor sinks into his lower lip, mind running over every tweak he could make to increase odds of victory with the least danger of lives to lose.

Kero shuffles out a plan three sheets deep, one of the first, and lays it half atop his newest. If he pieced them like that. He hovers a finger over it, noting how he could mesh the two to make an even better plan, and pulls out a new sheet, his fingerprints stamping in the corner.

He scrawls it out, careful to keep lines clean with his stiff fingers.

He stares at the finished plan. Turns it over his head, tries to tear it apart as if it was the enemy's. Deems it good. The moon is sinking under the hills, he knows, for the way no silver is creeping under the edge of the tent as it has been, with cloudless skies and bright fullness.

A mockery of the battle plays in his head, faded like his fingerprints on the parchment. He slumps into the chair he abandoned hours ago, tilting his head back.

It was as good as he could get it, for now. The council would examine his best five in the morning, though that's the one they'd pick. All there was to do now was wait. He can practically feel the sun lurking just under the horizon, waiting to tint the sky in it's light.

A hand presses against his cheek, familiar and cool. Lina speaks softly, concern weary in her words. "The sun is almost up," she observes and if there'd been any vigor to her tone, it would have been scolding. As it is, it sounds accepting, if not a little disappointed. "Did you manage any rest at all?"

"I couldn't." He blinks lazily. Battle flickers against his closed lids.

Her hand falls to his shoulder and she rubs the heel of it against a knot she already knows exists. She sighs. "Is it done, at least?"

He gestures at it, placed neatly atop the others, centered among the mess. She doesn't bother observing it, as she'll see it in a couple hours. "Good."

"You shouldn't be up," he says, as if he isn't the boneless in a chair, tired down to his bones.

Her laugh is gentle. "I couldn't sleep much either, so I thought I'd see how you were doing."

He hums, accepting the answer. He'd expected her to show, anyway. None of them are sleeping quite right, especially those who are bearing all the weight. It's to be expected, with what lies before them, only growing larger.

They enjoy each other's silence, for a while. Days bring them none and sleep brings terrors of all the horrible what ifs.

"This is it," he says, staring at his black-tipped hands limp in his lap, isn't it?"

A moment of silence, solemnity and pre-grieving and wondering. "Yeah," she confirms gently. "It is."

He nods. "We stand a chance," he assures, swinging his head to the side to press an air soft kiss to her hand. "We just need to be ready."

Lina squeezes his shoulder. "We will be." He can all but feel her flimsy smile, beaten hope still shining.

There's a thud from behind and part of him already knows.

"Ambush!" Lina shouts, drawing her sword. Kero unsheathes his, eyes roaming their surroundings. A group shimmers, in the distance, coming into sight. Four High Mages that he sees, though there must be more. A half dozen, minumum.

"This," he mutters under his breath, "was not part of the plan." He'd considered the idea but deemed it too risky, too draining on resources that were too valuable to waste. Their warring neighbor has been smart thus far and has shown no signs of being reckless.

Which was probably part of their plan.

But luckily, because Kero knows war and desperation, he'd prepared for this, to the slightest extent, even if he hadn't planned for it.

"Mages," he calls, "shield! Remember the plan!" He'd gone over it in the morning, as he did the one before that. He'd cautioned that it was unlikely, but that they couldn't make assumptions.

Fighting is brutal, especially when it creeps up. Kero pushes to the front, Lina at his side, mages focusing on defense rather than attack, soldiers fighting as they can.

It is not perfect. They win, in that they don't all die, but a few good men do. More than a few. More than he'd like. Not many, in the grand scheme, but in the moment? They have bodies that they simply have to leave.

He kneels for all them, lowers his head, murmurs a light thanks for their loyalty and their bravery, and then he orders them to move. The others rebel.

"We can't," one of the younger men says, striding forward angrily, "just leave them! We have to honor them."

"We have to fight a war and now the enemy knows we're coming. Where we are. We cannot waste hours on burial, or honoring. We will honor their sacrifices by living."

It's a thing he hates. Those men deserve better. They deserve burial and ceremony. But when they agreed to fight, they'd accepted that those things would not be given while their corpses were fresh, or at all. Those who agreed to come here -- to march in first, to be aggressive, to go after the warring king -- they knew the chances were even slimmer.

That night, at camp, he'll ask the names of the dead and pen them on a sheet. And instead of caring for the bodies, he'll burn their names, give them as good a ceremony as he can, when it's dangerous to linger.

He shakes his head, eyes fluttering shut, a small smile at his mouth. "People are depending on my strategies," he says. "We need to end this as soon as possible. Villages are getting razed."

"I know." She steps back and presses the knuckles of a hand against his spine, digging into tension hardened like stone. He stiffens at the pressure. "But you're no good if you exhaust yourself. Take the rest of the night. Please."

"I can't. I have a plan to finish and..."

"Let me give you a massage, at least." She presses her hands more insistently against his back. "You're tense. You need a break."

He blows a slow breath out his nose. "You're not going to take no for an answer, are you?"

"No."

"Fine, then. Just be quick."

"Always."

He moves to his cot, discarding his shirt.

Her knuckles roll across his back. Pleasing pain that does rest his mind a bit, resharpening the dull edges. Leaks the worst of the tension out. Takes a few years off his back, stress that will only return.

He lays after she's done, for a few moments. Her victorious smile is hot on his back. "Stop gloating," he mumbles. "So what, you are right this once."

"And the last time," she reminds him. "And the time before that. And before that."

He rolls onto his side and pulls himself up, glaring at her. "You got lucky." He shrugs his shirt back on, fabric still warm.

"I know you better," she refutes, "and I care."

His eyes roll. "“Just because this helped does not mean it was needed.”

She steps back. “Doesn’t it?”

“No.” He stretches, back not popping as it typically would. “But it is appreciated the same.”

She rolls her eyes. “Right.”

He sits back at his desk and eyes the map sitting there warily. His fingers trace down the length of his quill but he doesn’t pick it up. Lina, supportive as she is, notices the change. Of course. She probably sensed it from across the camp and that’s why she popped in.

“It’s not your fault,” she says softly. “Plans fall through, sometimes. It’s no mark on the strategist.”

“That village is lost.”

“You didn’t know about the High Mage. None of us did.”

He slumps forwards, elbows thudding against the wood. “I should have.”

The village burned. It’s high magic, causing that sort of sudden devastating fire and while he’d prepped for mages, he hadn’t prepped for a High Mage. Hadn’t prepped for half the village being engulfed in fire in the space of a moment, the other half lost by the next. The smoke sits, still, in his lungs, discomfort he’s earned.

People are dead.

“No.” Her hands, cool, press against his neck. The temperature is grounding. “You’re a strategist, not an oracle. You did your best. We all did.”

He sighs, weary. “I suppose.” But the weight doesn’t lift. The smoke doesn’t dissipate.