A HENRY STORY 1: Memories Of The Fallen Prince

XIX. Wielder of Light

Henry stood at the far side of the greatest cave in the citadel, overlooking the assembly of at least two hundred crawlers around him in the light of the quietly crackling brazier. He had asked Cevian to call a meeting with all the crawlers in the fortress, and here they were now—more than enough for his plan—eagerly awaiting his input.

Henry went over his plan once more to be certain he hadn't forgotten anything. Then Cevian, who stood a little offside, signaled that they were all here, and he cleared his throat to make his announcement: "I know how to defeat the cutters."

The bold words caused a wave of murmurs. "We cannot fight them, we cannot. How can we defeat them then, how can we?"

Henry turned his head when a singular voice spoke and saw a crawler cowering at his right, antennas raised. On a whim, he asked, "You—are you the same one who led me to the map? And talked to me earlier? Are you their leader?"

The crawler twitched his antennas in approval. "Zick, my name is, Zick. I am the leader of the crawlers in the citadel, I am."

They had a leader. That would benefit his plan. If he got their leader on his side, the rest would be more inclined to follow him.

"That is good to hear," said Henry. "They will need a leader if my plan is to work." He even gave something like a smile. Louder, he continued: "Yes, you understood me correctly—we will not run away, we will not out-stubborn them—we will fight them. And we will win. If all of you help, that is."

By this point, he had everyone's eager attention; even Cevian eyed him curiously. "Well," she said. "Don't keep us waiting any longer, will you?"

"See, but that is the fun part," Henry said with a crooked smile. He savored the moment of undivided attention a little longer. If she could see him, would Solovet finally be proud? If they are to respect you as their commander, you have to act like a commander too, she said in his head; it had been her very first lesson. Henry had never actually been a commander yet, but he had rehearsed the situation enough to be able to fake the experience he lacked.

He took a deep breath, straightened out his back, and lifted his chin before raising his voice again. Would he have to make this into a whole motivational speech? Henry had always excelled at motivating others, but never had the stakes been this high . . . or did he have an audience of crawlers. Oh well, what could go wrong?

"I am aware that you are not warriors," he began. "Cevian and I are, but so are the cutters, meaning they outnumber us by a great deal." Henry thought he would have heard a hairpin drop in the enormous cave. He smiled, allowing his mind to take him back to one of his many classes on military strategies. He recalled Solovet's stern face and her confidently raised finger, and he automatically raised his own. "So, what do you do when your enemy outnumbers you? An ancestor of mine, who lived not long after Sandwich himself, once solved this problem with great effectiveness. He had even claimed that his own strategy was based on one that had, long ago, been used in the Overland."

Henry explained that the human general of ancient had been facing an outstandingly superior number of gnawers. So, instead of seeking direct combat, he had lured them down a narrow tunnel with multiple side entrances and, from there, set a trap: the humans would wait in the side tunnels, and once the gnawers, inevitably forced to traverse the tunnel in a column, passed through, they attacked and split the single line of rats into multiple groups to fight separately. According to Solovet, it had been one of the most glorious and unexpected victories the humans had ever celebrated.

"My plan now is simple," Henry said with a very un-commander-like, crooked grin. "We may not have a narrow tunnel or the number of warriors to split a mass like the cutters into sections like my ancestor," he paused, "but we have something else—we have you."