The Company of Shadows (Wellington Undead Book 3) (19 page)

Dan’s expert eye missed nothing, lingering on the lugs onto which a bayonet would be attached, fitting it securely to the end of the barrel. He was pleased to say that every man had tied a strip of cloth tightly over the firing pan, ensuring that it would stay at least somewhat clean during the long march that lay before them. This wasn’t a parade square in England, after all. Sometimes Dan realized that the 33rd had been away for so long, he’d practically forgotten what a rainy British day actually felt like. No, this was half a world removed from that green and pleasant land. The men’s boots were in good repair, though already collecting a thin film of dust that dulled their sheen in the pre-dawn light.

Finally satisfied, the CSM gave a grunt of approval. From their ranks, some of the Shadows responded with a small sigh of relief. A happy Company Sergeant Major usually meant a happy officer, and that in turn usually made for a happier company all round.

“Cmp’nee! Cmp’nee. Will. Stand at. EASE!” the CSM bellowed. Eighty-four sets of boots slammed into the dirt with a thud.

“Cmp’nee! Cmp’nee. Will. Fall. OUT!”

Obediently, the men pivoted on their heels and fell out of their ranks.

“Don’t you go nowhere, you bleeding great shower…half of you are going to get issued with special munitions.” Even in the soft gloom that presaged the rising of the sun, Dan could see toothy grins forming on the faces of those men who were going to accompany Captain Campbell on the mission to Talwada. Special munitions was a phrase calculated to make any soldier of the Shadow Company ecstatic. They were kept under lock and key most of the time, in a pair of heavy wooden chests to which only Major General Wellesley and CSM Nichols had been entrusted with the keys…and with damned good reason, Dan thought ruefully, because the contents of each one consisted of an absolute fortune in silver.

He detailed off two pairs of men to go and fetch the chests from the quartermaster’s tent, where they were kept under the watchful eye of an armed guard both night and day. The four private soldiers returned some ten minutes later, huffing and puffing at the weight of the precious metals they carried between them at the double-time. Each chest was braced with a pair of black iron bands which reinforced the wood all the way up and across the curved lid. The soldiers set both chests down on the ground in front of Dan, releasing the iron handles gratefully. One of the Shadows – the largest of the four, a former poacher from Northumberland named Smart – massaged the palm of his right hand, where the sturdy black handle had bitten into the callused flesh.

A single key, plain and ordinary in appearance, hung on a thin chain around Dan’s neck for just such occasions as these. He did not even take it off in order to sleep. Yet he removed it now, slipping the row of small links up and over his head. Stooping, Dan fitted the key into the lock on the front of the chest and turned it. He was pleased to see that the quartermaster had been keeping the tumblers nicely lubricated, for the moved with ease. After flipping back the lid on hinges that also moved smoothly, he repeated the same process for the second chest.

“Alright lads, form an orderly queue.” Dan always supervised the distribution of special munitions himself. Delegating the job out to a subordinate just seemed wrong, somehow. He had thought about it for all of a few seconds, but simply couldn’t bring himself to turn the task over to a corporal or even a sergeant. Major General Wellesley had assigned the key to him personally, and to him alone. So that was that.

By now, the company’s ranks had been cut in half: Forty-four of their number had gone to undertake their regular duty of interring the army’s vampire officers in the ground, before the morning sun rose any higher in the sky above them. The remainder had formed a line, exactly as they had been instructed, and were now waiting patiently but with an air of almost palpable excitement for Dan to dole out the contents of the two chests.

The CSM enlisted the help of Corporal Weston, assigning him the task of recording each award in the company ledger. A Shadow would step up, and Dan issued him with a silver-plated bayonet, twenty rounds of silver ammunition, and the most prized possession of all, a heavy grenade. Once the pre-cut fuse was lit on this deadly sphere, all that the wielder had to do was fling it toward the enemy and then take cover. Apart from the explosive core, the interior of the grenade was filled with silver fragments and filings; when the thing went off, any vampires or weres that were unfortunate enough to find themselves caught in the blast radius would soon be very, very sorry indeed.

“Name.”

“Collins, sir.”

“Bayonet, silver, one. Rounds, silver, twenty. Grenade, silver, one. Sign here.” Weston offered up the open ledger, indicating the proper line with the tip of one grubby finger.

“Can’t read or write, Corporal,” said Collins resolutely.

“Then make your bloody mark,” the exasperated NCO sighed, tapping his fingertip impatiently on the paper. When he was finished stuffing the items into his backpack, Private Collins took the proffered quill in one hand, dipped the nib lightly in the open pot of black ink that rested on the ground between the two chests, and awkwardly scratched out an ‘X’.

“Move on, lad.” The CSM chivvied him along, wanting to keep the line moving as quickly as possible. Before they had both turned in for the night, the captain had mentioned that he wanted to be underway as soon after first light as possible. While the bulk of the main army could march only at night, the small force of Shadows found themselves under no such restriction. It had no vampires to take into consideration, and so the only limits would be those imposed by how tired the men were.

“Name.”

“Kelly, sir.”

“Bayonet, silver, one. Rounds, silver, twenty. Grenade, silver, one. Sign here.”

The line was shrinking fast. Dan fell into an easy rhythm, doling out the silver while Weston took the signatures. He failed to hear the stealthy footfalls coming up from behind him until both Wellesley and Campbell stepped directly into his line of sight.

“A very good morning to you, CSM,” the general said with what was, for him at least, something approaching good cheer.

“And the same to you, sir. Captain.” He acknowledged Campbell with a nod.

“All ready for the off?” Wellesley enquired.

“Just as soon as the last of the silver gets signed out, sir. Shouldn’t be too much longer,” he promised.

“I should say not.” The general noted that only seven more men remained in the line. “Captain Campbell, do you require anything further before I retire for the day?”

“Not at all, sir. I’ll bid you a pleasant day’s rest, and shall commend you into the care of the CSM.”

Wellesley seemed puzzled at the remark. “Whatever do you mean, Captain?”

“My detail of forty Shadows is almost ready to march, sir,” explained Campbell, equally puzzled at having been made to state the obvious. “Those who remain behind to watch over yourself and the senior officers shall be ably commanded by CSM Nichols.”

“Ah, I see. That shan’t be necessary.”

“Not necessary?” Colin had a hard time crediting what he was hearing. “General, with respect, the Maratha army may have been mauled and be pulling back, but they still possess a number of European vampire officers—”

“Which our own officers have been more than capable of countering up until now,” Wellesley answered, cutting him off with a good-natured wave of the hand. “We shall have our half-company of Shadows to protect us while we sleep. They can perform that task perfectly well under the guidance of a more junior non-commissioned officer.

“Whereas you, Captain Campbell, are hunting a true beast. No offence intended, of course,” Arthur added, as the implications of what he had said suddenly hit him. He was sending a were-tiger to kill a were-tigress, after all. Campbell was a British officer through and through, and although Wellesley had up until now felt no doubts whatsoever about where his loyalties might lie… he suddenly could not help but wonder whether some kind of connection, maybe even a bond, might possibly form between the newly-born tiger and the female who had sired him.

Was it possible that Jamelia might somehow be able to seduce Campbell and bring him over to her own side, turn him against the king and country that he had served so faithfully ever since he was a mere boy?

Better safe than sorry.

He would give Colin Campbell the benefit of the doubt, as befit his standing as an officer and a gentleman, but just in case Jamelia was successful in working her wiles on him, some kind of countermeasure was needed.

And that countermeasure was Daniel Nichols.

Arthur knew that Nichols was as straight and trusty as a battered old ramrod. The CSM seemed pleased at Campbell’s appointment, only too happy to turn the reins of the Shadow Company over to a more senior man. Arthur got the impression that the two men would work together extremely well, and he prayed that this new niggling doubt would turn out to be unfounded. However, should that turn out to not be the case, then he was confident that the CSM would handle the matter in his typical efficient manner.

Should young Campbell show any signs of treasonous behavior, then the CSM would have his captain killed on the spot. It would be done with a twinge of regret, the vampire knew, but without even a moment’s hesitation. Daniel Nichols hadn’t risen through the ranks to become the senior non-commissioned officer of the 33rd’s foremost company without displaying a ruthless streak when circumstances required it.

Arthur hoped that they wouldn’t require it in this case, but one never knew…

“If you’re sure that you can spare him,” Campbell said doubtfully, “then I’d only be too glad to have the CSM aboard.”

“Happy to serve, sir, in whatever capacity the General sees fit,” Dan replied, his eyes flicking back and forth between the two men. He was trying to read whatever subtext seemed to be passing between the vampire and the were, but gave up when he realized that while Wellesley was playing his cards close to his chest (no surprise there), Campbell just seemed to be genuinely confused.

“Splendid.” Wellesley offered them both a thin smile. “I expect that you’ll be leaving, what…within the hour?”

“That was my intent, sir,” Campbell said, looking across to where the majority of his small force had clustered, and were talking excitedly in low voices about the mission that lay ahead of them. The general suddenly became aware of the seven men who were still waiting to check out their special munitions, realized that he was holding things up.

“Then nothing remains other than for me to say this: good hunting, Captain Campbell.” Colin was on the verge of offering him a salute, but Wellesley uncharacteristically offered him his hand instead. Colin accepted and shook it. It never failed to surprise him, the coolness of a vampire’s flesh. It was also perfectly dry.

“Thank you, sir.”

With a nod to Nichols (and what was the meaning of the look which passed between the two men, Colin wondered) the general stalked off in the direction of his command tent, both hands clasped serenely behind his back. Campbell turned back to face Nichols, a question forming on his lips, but the CSM and Weston were already back at work.

“Name.”

“Hopkins, sir.”

“All right, Hopkins. Bayonet, silver, one. Rounds, silver, twenty. Grenade, silver, one. Sign here...”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Like two disenchanted would-be lovers breaking off their engagement, the small detachment of Shadows and the main body of fighting men both went their separate ways. The Shadows left first, shrugging packs onto their backs and shouldering their weapons easily. It was a quarter past eight by Captain Campbell’s watch, which still left them with a full day’s worth of marching time.

The army itself would remain encamped until nightfall, resting and taking care of the thousand and one administrative tasks that were necessary to keep a large body of men on campaign for any length of time. When the sun went down, the forty-four remaining Shadows that now stood a rotating watch over the graves of its vampire officers, would reverently exhume their coffins from the ground. They knew that Major General Wellesley would want the army to have struck camp and on the march before the last slivers of sunlight were gone from the evening sky.

“A fine day for it, CSM.” Campbell took in the clear blue sky above their heads, with only a handful of scudding white clouds to mar its perfection.

“That it is, sir, but I’ll bet it gets bleeding hot later on.”

“I wouldn’t take that bet, no matter how generous the terms.” Both men had spent long enough in India to know that by noon, each of them would be sweltering.

The half-company moved entirely on foot. Some officers would have taken a mount, riding along in comfort while the men slogged it out step by step; some of the little perfumed princes that Nichols had served under in the past would even have gone so far as to bring a pack mule, so that they could bring along a couple of bags of personal items. He was pleased to see that Captain Campbell wasn’t such an officer, and neither had he pegged him as one from the outset. That sort of “gentleman” would never be seen at the head of his troops, leading them on an escalade against a fortified town.

Fortunately, their new Captain was made of sterner stuff.