"Disturbances," Oliver said, giving him a more serious answer than what he'd given Rofus. "And then lack of them. Something just felt off."
Northman considered it for a second, before nodding. "Aye… It was too quiet. We expected an attack from the trees, or at least, we prepared for it... but not well enough, apparently. You fancy taking part in this extermination properly? If I could get the men home without losing a man, then this would have been a damn fine week."
"That was always my intention," Oliver said. "Make proper use of me, Commander, and I will perform. I care not if you're a Serving Class man or not. If you speak sense, then I will obey you without issue. You offend me more when you do not give me work than if you send me into danger."
"Right," Northman said, smiling slightly. "Right. Aye. I can work with that."
They both left it there, each a little more relieved that they'd cleared up the somewhat awkward positioning between the two of them.
Within the hour, they'd made it towards the end of the valley. Finally, Oliver laid sight of Dollem Fort. He could see why the bandit earlier had called it the bowl. That was exactly what it seemed like. It seemed like the soup bowl of a giant, made out of mountains, with one side chipped off of it.
That side had been patched up with fresh and old wood, making a solid barrier. The remains from where the previous gate had been built were obvious, with the dark stains of weather wood, but the newer stuff too was just as obvious. Its quality was lesser, and the pieces were smaller, but they achieved the job well enough.
Oliver could see archers walking on the raised platforms already. They were doing it purposefully, it seemed. There were nearly forty men up there. They seemed to want to give the impression that the fort was heavily manned. If they hadn't heard from the bandit earlier about the trap, no doubt they would have fallen for it.
"What do you think of that?" Northman asked him. The man had come up with a plan. He'd apparently been put off earlier about how close they'd come to a tricky situation. Now he'd put all his thinking into guessing all the ways that their reversal might go wrong.
He feared that, if the people in the fort suspected something was wrong, they'd have a signal of some sort for the people in the woods, allowing them to scatter. It was not an impossible thought. Smoke signals were simple enough to make, especially when there was wet wood across the way for them to throw onto their fires to make them smokey.
"I'm in agreement," Oliver said. "It would be better to do it with fewer men, at least initially. Stay within range of the fort, unharness the horses and make it look as though we're setting up camp. That would keep the smoke signals from within the fort from alerting them. But as the Vice-Captain said, it's just as likely that they've got scouts in the trees.
If we take too long pinning their camp down, the scouts will inform them and they'll be scattered to the wind before we can cut them down."
"Can we deal with the scouts before we make it to the camp?" Northman asked, more to himself than anyone else. They were staring at a map over the top of a table behind one of the wagons and away from the prying eyes of those atop the walls. "Or can we make it to the camp before the scouts?"
He traced his finger across the patch of forest that they believed the men to be in and envisaged it in his mind, wondering how quickly they would manage to discover it. How much land was there to search? Not much, surely. If the ambush was to be done properly, then those men would be opposite the fort, wouldn't they? Then they should need to just trace back.
"We only need to deal with the scouts from one direction," Oliver guessed. "We can then feed the men in through that route. It also depends on how big their number is. The bandit said half, but that could be a hundred men."
"Our intelligence said there were only a hundred or so in this fort," Cormrant put in.
"Until the moment that you confirm the enemy's numbers with your own eyes, always assume there is more," Oliver said, quoting Volguard. Many foreign armies preferred to split their forces up into different groups for the march, sending them across different routes towards the battlefield. Only when they were on the battlefield could a proper tally be taken, and even then, they ought to be wary.
"It's a good point," Northman said reluctantly. "If there were more men, we wouldn't know. Not with these trees. We need to tread carefully. I'd want to play it cautiously if we could. Ser Patrick, with five men, could you locate it for us?"
"If he's seen, then they'll scatter," Cormrant reminded him. "That's too weighty a task to give a boy. Meaning no offence, Ser."
"He's the one that found us the information in the first place," Northman pointed out. "If he's the one that loses what he was to find, then there's none that can complain about that, is there?"
Cormrant went silent, unable to argue.
"Are you fine choosing from your own men?" Northman said. "I know the situation is not ideal. There's no camaraderie there. It's only been a couple of hours, after all."
"I'll make it work," Oliver assured him. "I'll gather them now. Give us thirty minutes."
"Right," Northman said firmly. "Cormrant is right, Ser. This is a weighty task. Not one to be given to a boy your age, not under normal circumstances."
"Your General says otherwise, as does the High King, Commander," Oliver said, "I do not expect to fail."