Not in a glorious charge. No. They were being sent into the splintered throat of the Tangled Wood, a half-mile of collapsed tunnels and poisoned fog, to retrieve a dead courier’s satchel. The adult officers called it a “rank-defining mission.” Eli knew the translation: expendable.
Eli’s own rank was a lie. He was a “Lance-Corporal” in the 17th River Ward Boy’s Brigade, a formation of orphaned, starved, and abandoned children pressed into service as message-runners, trench-diggers, and—when the adult soldiers were too drunk or too dead—trigger-pullers. The Brigade’s ranks were a cruel parody of the real army’s. A “Sergeant” was just the boy who had survived the longest. A “Private” was a fresh face with trembling hands. And a “Corporal” like Eli? He was a compromise between ambition and a lingering heartbeat. boy brigade rank
He put the whistle to his lips and blew. Not in a glorious charge
And somewhere in the dark, Corporal Thorne—watching through a periscope from the safety of the rear—lowered the lens and whispered a single word to himself. The adult officers called it a “rank-defining mission