Red Country (48 page)

‘—two blacksmiths, a horse trader, a fur trader, an undertaker, a barber boasting of surgical qualifications, a pair of laundry women, a vintner with no stock, and seventeen persons
of no stated profession.’

‘Vagrants and layabouts hoping to grow fat on my crumbs! Is there no honour left, Temple?’

‘Precious little,’ said Temple. Certainly his own stock was disgracefully meagre.

‘And is Superior Pike’s . . .’ Cosca leaned close to Friendly and after taking another swallow from his flask whispered, entirely audibly, ‘
secret wagon
in the
camp?’

‘It is,’ said Friendly.

‘Place it under guard.’

‘What’s in it, anyway?’ asked Brachio, wiping some damp from his weepy eye with a fingernail.

‘Were I to share that information, it would no longer be a secret wagon, merely . . . a wagon. I think we can agree that lacks mystique.’

‘Where will all this flotsam find shelter?’ Jubair wished to know. ‘There is hardly room for the fighting men.’

‘What of the barrows?’ asked the Old Man.

‘Empty,’ said Sweet. ‘Robbed centuries ago.’

‘I daresay they’ll warm up something snug. The irony, eh, Temple? Yesterday’s heroes kicked from their graves by today’s whores!’

‘I thrill to the profundity,’ muttered Temple, shivering at the thought of sleeping in the dank innards of those ancient tombs, let alone fucking in them.

‘Not wanting to spoil your preparations, General,’ said Sweet, ‘but I’d best be on my way.’

‘Of course! Glory is like bread, it stales with time! Was it Farans who said so, or Stolicus? What is your plan?’

‘I’m hoping that scout’ll run straight back and tell his Dragon friends there’s no more’n twenty of us down here.’

‘The best opponent is one befuddled and mystified! Was that Farans? Or Bialoveld?’ Cosca treated Sworbreck, busy with his notebooks, to a contemptuous glare. ‘One
writer
is very much like another. You were saying?’

‘Reckon they’ll set to wondering whether to stay tucked up at Ashranc and ignore us, or come down and wipe us out.’

‘They’ll trip over a shock if they try it,’ said Brachio, jowls wobbling as he chuckled.

‘That’s just what we want ’em to do,’ said Sweet. ‘But they ain’t prone to come down without good reason. A little trespass on their ground should hook
’em. Prickly as all hell about their ground. Crying Rock knows the way. She knows secret ways right into Ashranc, but that’s a hell of a risk. So all we do is creep up there and leave
some sign they won’t miss. A burned-out fire, some nice clear tracks across their road—’

‘A turd,’ said Jubair, pronouncing the word as solemnly as a prophet’s name.

Cosca raised his flask. ‘Marvellous! Lure them with a turd! I’m reasonably sure Stolicus never recommended
that
, eh, Temple?’

Brachio squeezed his big lower lip thoughtfully between finger and thumb. ‘You’re sure they’ll fall for this turd trap?’

‘They’ve been the big dogs around here for ever,’ said Sweet. ‘They’re used to slaughtering Ghosts and scaring off prospectors. All that winning’s made
’em arrogant. Set in old ways. But they’re dangerous, still. You’d best be good and ready. Don’t reel ’em in ’til they’ve swallowed the hook.’

Cosca nodded. ‘Believe me when I say I have stood at both ends of an ambush and fully understand the principles. What would be your opinion of this scheme, Master Cantliss?’

The wretched bandit, his clothes splitting at the seams and stuffed with straw against the cold, had until then been sitting in the corner of the room nursing his broken hand and quietly
sniffling. He perked up at the sound of his name and nodded vigorously, as though his support might be help to any cause. ‘Sounds all right. They think they own these hills, that I can chime
with. And that Waerdinur killed my friend Blackpoint. Snuffed him out casual as you please. Can I . . .’ licking his scabbed lips and reaching towards Cosca’s flask.

‘Of course,’ said Cosca, draining it, upending it to show it was empty, then shrugging. ‘Captain Jubair has picked out eight of his most competent men to accompany
you.’

Sweet looked less than reassured as he gave the hulking Kantic a sidelong glance. ‘I’d rather stick with folks I know I can count on.’

‘So would we all, but are there truly any such in life, eh, Temple?’

‘Precious few.’ Temple certainly would not have counted himself among their number, nor anyone else currently in the room.

Sweet affected an air of injured innocence. ‘You don’t trust us?’

‘I have been often disappointed by human nature,’ said Cosca. ‘Ever since Grand Duchess Sefeline turned on me and poisoned my favourite mistress I have tried never to encumber
working relationships with the burden of trust.’

Brachio gave vent to a long burp. ‘Better to watch each other carefully, stay well armed and mutually suspicious, and keep our various self-interests as the prime motives.’

‘Nobly said!’ And Cosca slapped his thigh. ‘Then, like a knife in the sock, we make trust our secret weapon in the event of emergencies.’

‘I tried a knife in the sock,’ muttered Brachio, patting the several he had stowed in his bandolier. ‘Chafed terribly.’

‘Shall we depart?’ rumbled Jubair. ‘Time is wasting, and there is God’s work to be done.’

‘There’s work, anyway,’ said Sweet, pulling the collar of his big fur coat up to his ears as he ducked out into the night.

Cosca tipped up his flask, realised it was empty and held it aloft for a refill. ‘Bring me more spirit! And Temple, come, talk to me as you used to! Offer me comfort, Temple, offer me
advice.’

Temple took a long breath. ‘I’m not sure what advice I can offer. We’re far beyond the reach of the law out here.’

‘I don’t speak of the law, man, but of the righteous path! Thank you.’ This as Sergeant Friendly began to decant a freshly opened bottle into Cosca’s waving flask with
masterful precision. ‘I feel I am adrift upon strange seas and my moral compass spins entirely haywire! Find me an ethical star to steer by, Temple! What of God, man, what of God?’

‘I fear we may be far beyond the reach of God as well,’ muttered Temple as he made for the door. Hedges limped in as he opened it, clutching tight to his ruin of a hat and looking
sicker than ever, if that was possible.

‘Who’s this now?’ demanded Cosca, peering into the shadows.

‘The name’s Hedges, Captain General, sir, one of the drovers from Crease. Injured at Osrung, sir, leading a charge.’

‘The very reason charges are best left led by others.’

Hedges sidled past into the room, eyes nervously darting. ‘Can’t say I disagree, sir. Might I have a moment?’ Grateful for the distraction, Temple slipped out into the bitter
darkness.

In the camp’s one street, secrecy did not seem a prime concern. Men swathed in coats and furs, swaddled in torn-up blankets and mismatched armour stomped cursing about, churning the snow
to black slush, holding rustling torches high, dragging reluctant horses, unloading boxes and barrels from listing wagons, breath steaming from wrappings around their faces.

‘Might I accompany you?’ asked Sworbreck, threading after Temple through the chaos.

‘If you’re not scared my luck will rub off.’

‘It could be no worse than mine,’ lamented the biographer.

They passed a group huddled in a hut with one missing wall, playing dice for bedding, a man sharpening blades at a shrieking grindstone, sparks showering into the night, three women arguing over
how best to get a cook-fire started. None had the answer.

‘Do you ever feel . . .’ Sworbreck mused, face squashed down for warmth into the threadbare collar of his coat, ‘as though you have somehow blundered into a situation you never
intended to be in, but now cannot see your way clear of?’

Temple looked sidelong at the writer. ‘Lately, every moment of every day.’

‘As if you were being punished, but you were not sure what for.’

‘I know what for,’ muttered Temple.

‘I don’t belong here,’ said Sworbreck.

‘I wish I could say the same. But I fear that I do.’

Snow had been dug away from one of the barrows and torchlight flickered in its moss-caked archway. One of the pimps was busy hanging a worn hide at the entrance of another, a disorderly queue
already forming outside. A shivering pedlar had set up shop between the two, offering belts and boot-polish to the heedless night. Commerce never sleeps.

Temple caught Inquisitor Lorsen’s grating tones emerging from a cabin’s half-open door, ‘. . . Do you really believe there are rebels in these mountains, Dimbik?’

‘Belief is a luxury I have not been able to afford for some time, Inquisitor. I simply do as I’m told.’

‘But by whom, Captain, by whom is the question. I, after all, have the ear of Superior Pike, and the Superior has the ear of the Arch Lector himself, and a recommendation from the Arch
Lector . . .’ His scheming was lost in the babble.

In the darkness at the edge of the camp, Temple’s erstwhile fellows were already mounting up. It had begun to snow again, white specks gently settling on the manes of the horses, on Crying
Rock’s grey hair and the old flag it was bound up with, across Shy’s shoulders, hunched as she steadfastly refused to look over, on the packages Lamb was busy stowing on his horse.

‘Coming with us?’ asked Savian as he watched Temple approach.

‘My heart is willing but the rest of me has the good sense to politely decline.’

‘Crying Rock!’ Sworbreck produced his notebook with a flourish. ‘It is a most intriguing name!’

She stared down at him. ‘Yes.’

‘I daresay an intriguing story lies behind it.’

‘Yes.’

‘Would you care to share it?’

Crying Rock slowly rode off into the gathering darkness.

‘I’d call that a no,’ said Shy.

Sworbreck sighed. ‘A writer must learn to flourish on scorn. No passage, sentence or even word can be to the taste of
every
reader. Master Lamb, have you ever been interviewed by an
author?’

‘We’ve run across just about every other kind of liar,’ said Shy.

The biographer persisted. ‘I’ve heard it said that you have more experience of single combat than any man alive.’

Lamb pulled the last of the straps tight. ‘You believe everything you hear?’

‘Do you deny it, then?’

Lamb did not speak.

‘Have you any insights into the deadly business, for my readers?’

‘Don’t do it.’

Sworbreck stepped closer. ‘But is it true what General Cosca tells me?’

‘From what I’ve seen, I wouldn’t rate him the yardstick of honesty.’

‘He told me you were once a king.’

Temple raised his brows. Sweet cleared his throat. Shy burst out laughing, but then she saw Lamb wasn’t, and trailed off.

‘He told me you were champion to the King of the Northmen,’ continued Sworbreck, ‘and that you won ten duels in the Circle in his name, were betrayed by him but survived, and
finally killed him and took his place.’

Lamb dragged himself slowly up into his saddle and frowned off into the night. ‘Men put a golden chain on me for a while, and knelt, because it suited ’em. In violent times folk like
to kneel to violent men. In peaceful times they remember they’re happier standing.’

‘Do you blame them?’

‘I’m long past blaming. That’s just the way men are.’ Lamb looked over at Temple. ‘Can we count on your man Cosca, do you reckon?’

‘Absolutely not,’ said Temple.

‘Had a feeling you’d say that.’ And Lamb nudged his horse uphill into the darkness.

‘And they say I’ve got stories,’ grumbled Sweet as he followed.

Sworbreck stared after them for a moment, then fumbled out his pencil and began to scratch feverishly away.

Temple met Shy’s eye as she turned her mount. ‘I hope you find them!’ he blurted. ‘The children.’

‘We will. Hope you find . . . whatever you’re looking for.’

‘I think I did,’ he said softly. ‘And I threw it away.’

She sat there a moment as though considering what to say, then clicked her tongue and her horse walked on.

‘Good luck!’ he called after her. ‘Take care of yourself, among the barbarians!’

She glanced over towards the fort, from which the sounds of off-key singing were already beginning to float, and raised one eyebrow.

‘Likewise.’

Bait

T
he first day they rode through towering forest, trees far bigger’n Shy ever saw, branch upon branch upon branch blocking out the sun so she
felt they stole through some giant’s crypt, sombre and sacred. The snow had found its way in still, drifted a stride deep between the crusted trunks, frozen to a sparkling crust that skinned
the horse’s legs, so they had to take turns breaking new ground. Here and there a freezing fog had gathered, curling round men and mounts as they passed like spirits jealous of their warmth.
Not that there was much of that to be had. Crying Rock gave a warning hiss whenever anyone started in to talk so they just nodded in dumb misery to the crunching of snow and the laboured breaths of
the struggling horses, Savian’s coughing and a soft mumbling from Jubair which Shy took for prayers. He was a pious bastard, the big Kantic, that you couldn’t deny. Whether piety made
him a safe man to have at your back she profoundly doubted. Folk she’d known to be big on religion had tended to use it as an excuse for doing wrong rather’n a reason not to.

Only when the light had faded to a twilight glimmer did Sweet lead them to a shallow cave under an overhang and let them stop. By then the mounts and the spare mounts were all blown and
shuddering and

Shy wasn’t in a state much better, her whole body one stiff and aching, numbed and prickling, chafed and stinging competition of complaints.

No fire allowed, they ate cold meat and hard biscuit and passed about a bottle. Savian put a hard face over his coughing like he did over everything else, but Shy could tell he was troubled with
it, bent and hacking and his pale hands clawing his coat shut at his neck.

One of the mercenaries, a Styrian with a jutting jaw by the name of Sacri, who struck Shy as the sort whose only comfort in life is others’ discomfort, grinned and said, ‘You got a
cough, old man. You want to go back?’