Despite the hour, an exhausted-looking Edana answered Frances’s message. Her tiredness had faded as the trio explained what had occurred, and by extension, what Jessica and Leila had done to her dear student.

Edana was incensed. Her tired green eyes had snapped open, bright with fury. She completely agreed with what Frances and her friends had done. There was a complication, however.

“The War Council and the Red Order will be notified, and they will be punished. Frances, as my apprentice and thus, a White Order Mage, I am recognizing your arrest of Jessica and Leila, and am charging you with taking them to the rally area near Freeburg, disarmed. I know you would prefer them to be kept far away from you, but for the moment, we need their magic at Freeburg,” Edana had said in a grudging tone.

Frances frowned at her teacher. “I don’t know if we can trust them, Master.”

“You shouldn’t. They are bullies and it’s clear that they haven’t changed. That being said, we do need their magic. When the battle starts, avoid them if possible, but if they do try anything, and I do mean anything, let me or the superior officer on the field know and they will be punished.”

“Master Edana, um, who is going to be the commanding officer of this force?” Elizabeth asked.

There was no humour in the smile Edana gave the three teenagers.

“Well, right now, nobody’s in command. All the unqualified, foppish Erisdalian nobles are fighting over the position. Countess Esther of Conthwaite has begged off the task due to her old war injury. I don’t blame her, but it makes my job much harder.”

“Why not Martin, or his older sister, um, what’s her name?” Elizabeth asked, looking apologetic.

Martin waved his hand. “Mara. Thing is, she’s leading the Erisdalian Expeditionary Force in Roranoak. And I’m… not sure if I want to command the entire force.”

“I understand that. I want to warn you both, though, your recent achievements have made many in the War Council think that you both should be given additional responsibilities to match your talents. To that end, when we do decide on a commander, she will ask you to lead some of the Otherworlders.”

Command her classmates? Frances swallowed. She just knew this was going to turn out terribly—

“Frances, you are going to be fine. You’ll be holding joint command with Martin. You may not be completely ready, but nobody is for their first command.”

Although Frances didn’t know why the words seemed to resonate with her, she found herself nodding, and feeling less like she wanted to run out of the door.

“Master Edana, do we know who is the enemy commander?” Martin asked.

“We’re not sure. We thought it would be General Berengaria, but after we broke through Westfall into Kwent, she resigned.” Edana yawned, covering her hand with her mouth, “I’m sorry, but I need to try to catch some rest.”

“We understand, master Edana.” Frances forced herself to smile. “Thank you for having faith in us.”

And that was how Frances and her friends now rode behind a free, but wandless and weaponless Jessica and Leila, a good distance away. They only had a day left before they got to Freeburg, but for the moment, the party rode in awkward silence.

Frances couldn’t help but scowl at the pair, even when they did glance behind them and met her glare. Funnily enough, if either Jessica and Leila did find themselves meeting her gaze, they immediately looked forward.

As they rode over yet another hill, nearer to the mountains, Elizabeth whined, “Martin, I know I have asked this a lot, but are we there yet?”

Martin, his lips pressed in a thin line, gave a nod. As much as he didn’t like his friend complaining, he had to admit, the sheer absurdity of their situation was bothering him greatly.

“Yes. We are there.”

“Oh, good God, finally!” Elizabeth wailed.

Frances pulled her horse to a halt, observing the land before them.

Unlike Westfall Pass, the one leading to Freeburg looked less like the mountains forming a V, and more like someone had cut straight down into the mountains. Moreover, unlike Kwent, these mountains were of foreboding dark-grey stone.

Spread before them, just before the pass, was a camp in general disarray. Upon a grassy plain, tents had been pitched willy nilly around small fires with wisps of smoke curling up to the sky.

The party rode towards the gathering. At least someone had set up a rough paddock for the horses. They dismounted and put their horses inside, before escorting Jessica and Leila towards the main camp.

“Fo—Frances, we’ve arrived, can you at least let us have our weapons back?” Jessica asked, accompanying her request with a smile.

Frances, her wand drawn and in her hand, though, not pointing at either Jessica or Leila, shook her head. “Not until I find out who is commanding the army and listen to her explain what is to be done with you.”

As she spoke, her eyes searched the tents, and the familiar faces drawing near.

More and more of her classmates were gathering outside, in various states of clothing and equipment, watching them enter into the camp. Frances hoped they didn’t recognize her. It would be so much easier if they didn’t, but she knew they probably would.

“Hey everyone, do you know where we can find the commander’s tent?” Elizabeth asked waving a hand.

A stocky youth with brown hair stood up from where he was sitting and walked over. “Hey, Liz. She’s some lady ranger in a green cloak who just got here. I saw her and her guards near the centre of the camp set up their tents. Said told us we’re to assemble at the mess tent in half an hour.” He tilted his head to Jessica and Leila. “Hey, Jess. Why are you looking so sour?”

Jessica sighed. “Oh, I don’t know, George. Because Leila and I were arrested by—”

“For threatening the populace and attacking me—I’m Sir Martin of Conthwaite, son of Countess Esther of Conthwaite, upon whose lands you are currently camped on,” said Martin, stepping in with a winning smile. He extended his hand to George and shook the weakly proffered hand profusely.

George stammered. “I’m sure they didn’t mean it, sir Martin. They’re not bad people—”

A snort drew George’s eyes over to Frances, who had clamped her hand over her mouth.

George was one of Jessica and Leila’s few actual friends that wasn’t afraid of them. Yet, he always turned a blind eye to their bullying habits. Frances hadn’t meant to snort, but she found it absurd that he was still trying to defend them.

“Do you find something amusing about this?” George demanded

“Not really. Maybe a little—” Frances bit on her tongue, hard, wondering just why was she finding it so hard to resist retorting. “Look, George, there were over a dozen witnesses. Your friends are in trouble and they aren’t getting out of it without some kind of punishment. So can you show us the way to the commander’s tent, please?”

“Wait, hold on a sec, on whose authority were they arrested?” demanded a Caucasian girl striding up through the gathering crowd. Thanks to how closely cropped her brown hair was, Frances recognized the girl as Nicole, another of Jessica and Leila’s circle, though, Nicole had never bullied Frances directly.

Martin was about to speak up, but closed his mouth and abruptly turned to Frances expectantly. Simultaneously, Elizabeth slid in closer to Frances and coughed into her fist.

“On my master’s authority,” said Frances. She sighed and straightened. “Hi. I’m Frances Wendlan, you may know me as Funky Frances, Foul Frances, Frances the weird one, and Stinky Frances. My Master Edana, Grand Master of the White Order and member of the War Council authorized me to arrest Jessica and Leila after they, in front of Elizabeth and me, attacked Martin, son of the Lady of Conthwaite when they were confronted with the fact that they used to beat me up and bully me mercilessly.” Frances took a quick breath and raised her free hand. “Any further questions will have to wait until we find the commander’s tent. Goodbye.”

With that, Frances grabbed Jessica’s shoulder and pushed her former bully forward, making a path through the loose crowd of watching classmates.

Elizabeth, thinking fast, reached for Leila’s shoulders, but the girl snarled at her and she retreated. That is until Martin prodded Leila’s back with the pommel of his longsword, shooting her a cold glare. She grudgingly fell in line behind Jessica and Frances.

Except for the fact that the crowd of classmates asking questions didn’t stop. They followed and the crowd kept growing as Frances pushed Jessica through the camp to its centre.

To Frances’s mortification, as she chanced a glance over her shoulder, it looked like her party was tailed by what seemed like almost all her remaining classmates in Durannon.

“Why did you have to be so popular,” Frances muttered.

“I’m not. They just want to watch me get it,” Jessica hissed back.

Frances blinked. She always thought Jessica never got punished for her bullying at school because she was the popular alpha of the school. What had changed in this world? Elizabeth had said that they were less tolerant of Jessica and Leila’s habits but to such an extent?

Bottling up her own questions for later, Frances searched the centre of the camp and frowned. There was not just one woman with a green cloak, but a group of green cloaked rangers, who were speaking to some men at arms.

Suddenly, Frances’s eyes spotted in the group a familiar a lady of average height with hard, brown eyes.

“Baroness Igraine? Baroness!”

Frances’s yell caught Igraine’s attention and she turned. In a snapshot, she seemed to take in Frances, Jessica, her party, and the gaggle of Otherworlders, all at once.

Then, those dark brown eyes abruptly narrowed and Igraine’s lips warped into a wolfish snarl.

“Oi! All of you halt!”

The bellow arrested everybody in their tracks, some in mid-step. The stood, staring, and before they could start speaking—

“Stand to attention!”

The teens all had basic military training and snapped their arms to their sides, standing straight.

“What is this all about? I asked for you all to assemble in front of the mess tent, not in front of my tent!”

When nobody answered her, Igraine’s eyes fell on Frances. “Well? Apprentice Frances, can you explain?”

Frances coughed to clear her throat and slowly, without trying to make her classmates look bad, explained that they were bringing Jessica and Leila to Igraine for judgement and that people had simply gotten curious. When Igraine stayed silent, Frances continued to explain what Jessica and Leila had done and the events at the inn.

When she was finally finished, Igraine, hands on her hips, didn’t say anything at first.

She looked extremely cross, though.

“Right. Jessica, Leila! The War Councilwill decide what your punishment is going to be,, but until then you’ll be under the utmost scrutiny. Tread lightly and do not disobey your orders. Is that clear?”

Leila looked like she wanted to curse the baroness with boils and Jessica scowled, but they saluted Igraine.

Frances and her friends relaxed, but the moment they did, Igraine fixed them with a gimlet glare. “As for you three, my tent. Everybody else, dismissed, though, I would get to the mess tent as you should be there soon.”

The classmates saluted and scattered, whilst the trio exchanged nervous glances, before following the baroness into her tent.

Once inside, the baroness skirted around the side of a table with a number of scrolls on it and faced the three teens. With a muscled arm, she pushed all of the scrolls to the side to reveal a map that laid out what had to be Freeburg Castle.

“Right, so that bit of theatre out there was so I can brief you three on my plan to take the fortress.”

At their owlish blinks, Igraine groaned. “Oi, snap out of it. I know you’re smart enough, Frances, and I was told you two uhhh, what are your names?”

Elizabeth tried her best not to glance at Frances, wondering how to ask her friend if this was the woman that Frances wanted to recommend to be her mentor.

“Elizabeth, milady.”

“Martin of Conthwaite, ma’am.”

“Esther’s younger boy? Ah, thought I recognized you. And you…” Igraine frowned. arched an eyebrow at Frances, and turned her gaze back towards Elizabeth. “Frances said you were interested in training under me.”

Internal wailing and gnashing of teeth was the order of the day for Elizabeth’s mind, amid flashes of lightning and crashing thunder in the background because she was not ready for this.

“Yeah! Sorry! I uh—You seem super cool and amazing and strict, but Frances and Martin had so many good things to say about you that well—it was just crazy how you managed to just cow all of my classmates and get them to listen to you, even those two bullies Leila and Jessica—”

“Okay stop. I like being told I’m great, but this is a bit much.” Igraine pursed her lips and her eyes softened. “ Meet me tomorrow morning at the crack of dawn and I’ll see if you have what it takes, Elizabeth. Expect to be worked hard.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

For a moment, Igraine smiled, before her expression calmed and she turned back to the three.

“Right, look at this castle. What do you notice that seems unusual?”

Frances had started studying the layout of the castle as soon as Igraine had spread the map out. The problem was that the entire castle was very unusual. The fortress was built against cliffs instead of on top of it, with one side dropping off into a ravine. Furthemore, the fortress’s five courtyards were split in half, the only way connecting the northern three with the southern two was by way of a bridge that spanned a chasm. Three of the courtyards had red-roofed buildings that had to serve as the castle’s living quarters and supply areas.

Frowning, Frances hesitated. “It’s below a cliff rather than on a cliff?”

Igraine said nothing, and so Martin, scratching his chin, piped up, “It has no moat?”

“It’s divided.”

Martin and Frances glanced at Elizabeth, whose eyes were wide, finger pointing to the bridge.

“It’s like Kwent guys. The only way across the two sections of the castle is the bridge. We need to seize control of the bridge to control the castle.”

Igraine grinned. “You’re all right, but I was hoping you’d notice the bridge. Good thinking, Elizabeth. Our plan is this. We’re going to launch an assault on the southern gate. As the attack commences, two companies of my rangers and a hundred of our best Otherworlders are going to scale the cliffs, and then rappel down the cliffside to seize the other side of the bridge. We’ll have to land in the Fourth Courtyard, but we can make our way to the Third Courtyard easily enough.”

It was a plan that seemed oddly similar to what they had tried at Kwent, and Frances found herself nodding to it.

Martin looked astonished, “You know a route up the cliffside?”

“We’re Leipmont Rangers, we’ll find a route. That, and your mother also graciously provided us with some maps of the area.”

Frances grimaced, she wasn’t so sure. “But what happens if they can’t control the bridge and we can’t push through to join them?”

“That’s why I’ll be here, and with you, commanding the other forty-six Otherworlders and Conthwaite’s reserves. With your magic, combined with Jessica and Leila’s, we should be able to blast through the walls.”

The ranger turned to Frances, “Frances, you are to command these forty-six Otherworlders, including Elizabeth, Jessica and Leila. Martin will be your second-in-command. Your task at the moment is to organize your forces, plan your assault on the southern two courtyards and report back to me in three days.”

Frances’s stomach churned uncomfortably at the news, but what could she say to that?

“Is there a problem, Frances?”

She shook her head. “No ma’am. I just… well, I don’t trust Jessica and Leila.”

“You shouldn’t. That’s why I’m putting them under your command so you can use any means necessary to assure their cooperation and good behaviour. Any other questions? No? Dismissed.”

The three teens saluted and exited the tent, gazes averted, deep in thought as they made their way back to their horses and gear.

They didn’t exchange any words, even as they found their assigned camping spot and began to set up their tents.

Martin was the first to speak up, his tone dry, with an amused smile quirking his lips.

“I wonder how your bullies are going to react when they find out?”

The knight snorted, answering himself. “They’re not going to be happy.”

Frances smiled at that but still found herself shaking her head. “It’s so weird, though. I mean… I was so scared of them, but now I can order them around like they did to me.”

“Karma?” Elizabeth mused.

Nodding in agreement with her friend, Frances felt the smile sticking more easily to her lips.

“Maybe. I’ll try to enjoy it while it lasts.”