Wine

Wine is a noteworthy town or city in the northern portion of the Lady's Empire that was mentioned in one conversation in The Black Company. It is associated with Jane and Wist, and is north of the Tower at Charm, the Empire's capital. The Imperial forces at Wist, Jane, and Wine were unprepared for a major campaign. Wine's precise geography is not supplied, but it seems to be in a region – which also contains Elm and Rye and possibly Vest – that is south of the province known as the Salient, and very likely west of the city of Lords.

The Black Company

After Whisper was Taken by the Lady, Soulcatcher mentioned Wine to Croaker in the Forest of Cloud:

“

If Nightcrawler doesn’t reach Lords first, we’ll lose the city and kingdom. Which might give them the momentum to drive us out of the north entirely. Our forces at Wist, Jane, Wine, and so forth, aren’t up to a major campaign. The north has been a sideshow till now.[1]

”

Soulcatcher knew the Imperial forces at Wine were insufficient for the pressure that the Rebel was now applying. Wine is not mentioned again in the Annals, but it was presumably one of the northern "cities abandoned to the Rebel" whose nine thousand "uncertain" garrison troops were organized into the three divisions of the "first level forces" commanded by Stormbringer, Moonbiter, and Bonegnasher at the notorious Battle at Charm.^[2]

The Silver Spike

Wine is not mentioned in The Silver Spike. But it may have been among the many unnamed towns and cities that were sacked by the Limper (the "wicker man"), Toadkiller Dog, and their ragtag army during their bloody southward march toward the Tower.^[3]

References