All is Fair in Love and War

Chapter 22

The next morning Seline and Will both awoke at the same time to the bugle sounding reveille. There was a murmur of voices outside as men went to relieve themselves in the nearby woods. Seline dressed quickly needing to walk further into the woods then the men so that she could have some privacy. She grabbed a bucket pretending to go down to the stream to get some water. No one questioned her. Will followed her to stand guard while she went. Seline was not thrilled about the lack of privacy, but it was better than being found out, or worse.

They filled the water bucket at the creek. Will took off his shirt and washed up there as well, Seline waited and washed up in the tent when they got back to camp. Will took a detour on the way back to give Seline some privacy, but to also scout around and see if he could get any more items for Seline that she may need. He came across a supply wagon that had tents, blankets, uniforms, mess kits, etc. He walked up and asked for a few of the things that Seline would need mainly a mess kit, blankets, and a uniform of the proper size. “This is not a handout son. If you lost your equipment we will replace it but it will come out of your pay when you receive it.” The soldier at the supply wagon informed him. Will did not care. He did not think that the military cared because many of these men would not be coming back to collect their pay anyway. He took the items that Seline needed, signed for them, and walked back to the tent.

Will crawled inside the tent only to find Seline getting ready to leave with the saddle bags and bed roll ready to be tied to the saddles. Will handed her the new supplies, and helped her repack the saddle bags. Everything was tied to the saddled horses and they took down the tent and packed that too. They were ready to leave. They grabbed their horses and walked them to the food line at the front of the camp. There were not that many men in line so they were able to get in line in sight of where they tied their horses. Grabbing their bacon and biscuits for the second day in a row they each grabbed their horses and walked to the far end of the camp while they ate.

Seline was starting to feel a little unnerved by the fact that they had not really spoken at all for the last 2 days. It made her worry that maybe Will was having second thoughts about having married her in such a hurry. When they reached the far end of the camp and they were far enough out of earshot of the men around, Seline gave voice to her concerns.

"Will, are you having second thoughts about marrying me? I know everything was so sudden and we all showed up here and did not really give you much of a choice. I am sorry for that. If you want to abolish the marriage I will understand. As soon as I leave here and go home I will stay away if that is what you want." Seline was barely holding back the tears now. Will had stopped walking. He turned and grabbed her wrist and dragged her to the woods where a few of the larger trees would give them some shelter. "Seline" Will said in barely a whisper. "Marrying you was the one thing in this life that I have been very sure about. I will never regret that. I do regret not being more concerned for your safety and making sure you were safely out of camp before morning, and now it is my fault that you are trapped in this mess. I have been trying to see a way out of this for you and I am not able to think of one. It has me frustrated. I know one will appear and when it does we will need to be ready to go the moment it happens. I love you. That does not ever change, and is something that I will never regret." He desperately wanted to kiss her and wrap her tightly in his arms until she could feel every ounce of love that he felt for her, but he knew that he would be endangering her and that would have to wait until tonight when they were alone in their tent. He settled for looking straight into her eyes and hoping that she could see the depth of his feelings there. They would need to be very careful from now on. There were too many people already that they needed to be careful of.

Will led Seline back to the horses and they mounted up as the men began to ready to leave. They watched as the other men that were on horseback also saddled their horses and mounted. The commander came looking for them with-in a couple minutes of them mounting their horses. He saw that they were waiting at the end of the line ready to leave. The commander tipped his hat at them and moved on. He had checked on them specifically to make sure that they were ready to go. Will thought to himself that he was never going to be able to smuggle Seline out of here with the commander keeping a close eye on them. He had to find a way to bring his attention to bear somewhere else.

After the men had fallen in at the sound of the bugle, the long line once again began to move and Will and Seline had taken up their place at the back. After about 5 minutes of walking the commander walked his horse to the back of the line and began to walk silently beside them again for the rest of the trip. It was going to be a long walk to the training grounds.