The Legacy of Gird (60 page)

Winter snows had always meant the end of military actions, but this winter brought no peace, only the slowing of movement. Gird, struggling to codify his laws with the help of Selamis and Arranha in Brightwater, sifted the reports from distant villages. Here a barton had ambushed a lord and two hands of guards, killing all of them and leaving that domain open; there two bartons had fought off a brigand attack, only to fall to the soldiers who came onto the scene when the battle was almost over. The merchants and craftsmen of Tarrho, a town about the size of Brightwater near the eastern border, had decided to overthrow their lord and declare their freedom—then the servants and laborers had rioted, overthrowing the merchants in their turn. Tarrho's small barton had tried to bring order, but had the trust of no faction; after bitter fighting that left many dead and the city without supplies of food, brigands rode in, looted everything, and set it afire. The king's messengers declared it was the fault of Gird and his rebels; the barton's survivors, who arrived in Brightwater before Midwinter, explained what had really happened.

"A good many of them brigand bands claims to be your yeoman, Gird," the yeoman-marshal said. "Nobody knows, for sure—I mean, if they aren't one of yours already, they don't. So they're afraid of your name, and the bartons."

"That's why we need to have our rules known," Gird said. "If they know we have rules, and what they are, and they see that we stick to them, then perhaps they'd trust us."

"Maybe." The yeoman-marshal did not look convinced. Gird peered at him.

"What do you think it would take?"

"Well—sir—I think they need something to see. We can say we have rules, but that's not enough, not for city folk used to looking up law in a book."

"Which is why I'm writing it down," said Gird, slapping the table and jostling Selamis's tools. He pointed at the younger man. "This is Selamis." He still would not say
my luap
. "He writes a better hand than I do, one anyone can read."

"That should help," the yeoman-marshal said, craning his head to see what was on the top sheet.

"It's very simple," Gird said. "I told him, we have to get it all into no more than four hands of rules—if people can count their fingers and toes, they'll be able to remember them."

And gradually, copy by copy, the first simple laws that later became the Code of Gird spread from barton to barton, even into the towns. Of necessity, these rules were suitable for a time of war; Gird could not possibly work out all the laws needed for trade and commerce in peacetime. But he was sure of his intent: cruelty was always wrong, and always harmed the community. Honesty and fair dealing were good, and helped it.

In the bitter cold and deep snows of winter, no army could march far. Stragglers came to Brightwater and the villages where Gird had some of his army encamped—starving, ragged, sometimes
dying of cold even as they staggered to a fire. Gird himself traveled from one camp to another as best he could, trying to make sure that food and warmth were shared fairly among them. He knew, without needing the gnomes' advice, that he would have to win in this coming year—at least he would have to control most of the farmland, so that his people could grow food again. Otherwise his army would starve, and then the lords would win without a fight.

Food stores dropped lower and lower. His yeomen did not grumble much, seeing Gird's belt as tight as theirs. But the soft cries of hungry children pierced him as if they were all his own. He hardly saw Rahi or Pidi, these days; Girnis had disappeared into the dust of war and he knew nothing of her. But the children in the camps were always with him, a reminder of what he was fighting for, and what would be lost if he failed.

It was in the first days of coming spring, uncertain weather that could bring thaw or hard freeze from day to day, that he took one of his cohorts out to seek food from one of the villages that had promised it the year before. They marched four days, south and east down the valley, across a ridge, and down another valley. Gird had sent a runner ahead. But instead of a yeoman marshal, or the barton, come to meet them, he found the entire village standing grim and unwelcoming in a snow-swept meadow nearby. They would not, they said, give anything—not one stone's weight of grain or handbasket of dried fruit. Begone, they said, before you bring the lords' wrath down on us. Gird nodded, and looked them up and down individually.

"What it comes down to, you don't trust me."

The cluster of ragged men and women said nothing. He hadn't expected them to admit it. No one met his eyes. Behind him, his cohort, even more ragged than the peasants from the village. He could hear their breathing, the rasp of pebbles under their feet when they shifted in place. He could feel, as if it were a hot iron, their rapt attention on the back of his neck. His own belly knotted with hunger; he knew theirs were empty too.

Gird tried again. "You agreed with us last year, you remember that?" He stared right at the headwoman, who stared at her feet. But she nodded, slowly. "Yes—you said you'd share your harvest with us, feed us, to help us win against the lords—"

"You didn't win." That voice was bitter, but low, from the back of the group. Gird could not tell which dark-wrapped head it had been, or whether man or woman.

"We haven't won
yet
," said Gird. "But we're a lot closer—Lady's tears, did you think it would be all one battle? We told you—"

" 'Twas a bad winter," said the headwoman, still avoiding his eye. "And them folokai got after flocks, near took the whole lamb crop."

"Tell 'em all, Mara," said the same bitter voice, louder this time.

"The lords come," the woman said. Now she looked up, and Gird could see a fresh scar across her face, the mark of a barbed lash that had almost taken her eye. "They said we had to have more than we could show. They said we'd been giving it to rebels, and they said they'd have no more of it. They took a child from every hearth—they come here, and where was you? Away, is all we know. No help. Help for help, that's what we say, and you've given no help."

"I'm sorry," said Gird. Now all the faces looked at him, all scarred one way or another, all bitter. All betrayed. He wanted to say
It's not my fault,
but knew that wouldn't help. They had protected many of the villages, in the past year: he thought of all those skirmishes and battles, the cost of it to his army. This year, given supplies enough, they'd control more territory, and fewer villages would suffer. But here they had not protected the people, and the people had changed their minds.

"They come oftener," the woman went on. "Check the fields, check the stores. Leave us bare enough for life, they do, and destroy the rest. Threaten the fields, if we give aught to rebels."

Could he promise they would not come again? Did he have the strength yet? Gird tried to think, but he wasn't sure. And a false promise would be worse than no promise. And if he told them how close he was to moving his lines on another league or so to the hills, would these betray him to their lords? Were they lost to him entirely?

"Gird?" That was Selamis, as usual. He had, no doubt, come up with some clever idea for saving the situation. Gird wished he could be properly grateful. He waved the man forward. Selamis muttered "The Marrakai gold?" in his ear. Well, it was a clever idea. Probably not what the Marrakai agent had intended the gold to be used for, but it might work. Although—if they went buying food, to replace what he bought, their lords would surely notice
that
, too.

But he had to try. His mouth dried, thinking of all possible consequences. "We have a bit of gold we found—"

"Found!" That was not a promising tone. Someone spat juicily; it splatted on the rock a bare handspan from Gird's boots. "They told us you brigands'd have gold—and what they'd do if we come to market with it. You're no better than they are, that's a fact. Take our food for your army—they do the same. Both raids us, neither protects—not them from you, nor you from them, and there's not a hair of difference."

He could not, even hungry as he was, drive these folk farther. Like it or not, they were the reason for his fighting, and he could not harm them—yet. Could they use the gold at some market? One of them might pass for a trader, perhaps—someone robbed on the road? That was common enough. Would that pesky priest wreathe his magicks for them, make someone safe in the towns? He might, but he would want something for it, and Gird did not yet trust him.

"We're not the same, and I think you know it. But you've had more trouble than you could stand; I understand that. We won't take it by force, but you think of this—one child from each hearth
now
—do you think that will satisfy them? I lost more than that, before I broke free. You need not be as stupid as I was."

"You lost children?" Others shushed that voice, someone in a leather cloak, but Gird answered it, counting them on his fingers.

"My first two sons died of fever; the lord refused us herb-right in the wood. My wife lost two babes young, one from hunger and one from fever. My eldest daughter they raped; killed her husband. The babe died unborn. My youngest son they struck down; he lives. Another daughter they struck down, breaking her arm; I know not if she lives or dies. And my brother's children, that I'd taken in: two of them dead, by the lords' greed. And that's children. I lost friends, my parents, my brother. You ask yourselves: if they can take one child, will they stop there? Will all your submission, all your obedience, get you peace and enough food? Has it
ever
worked? You can sit here and let them take you one by one, or you can decide to fight back."

And he turned, glared at his own unhappy men, and marched them away. No one called him back, but he was not surprised to find three of the villagers following his cohort when they had gone some distance—and ready to join him.

Still, such incidents made him touchy. He was trying to stretch a small bowl of gruel one day, when two of his marshals reported that the villages to which they'd applied had refused to give or sell supplies, on the grounds that they'd been raided by brigands. His patience snapped.

"I am so
sick
of this!" It came out louder than he meant, and he'd meant it loud enough. Everyone fell silent, watching him, which only made him angrier. He lowered his voice to a growl, all too aware that his growl was audible farther than some men's shouts. "All this dickering, like a farmer trying to work down the price of a bull. All this haggling with thieves and bullies, craft guilds and village councils. Any idiot should be able to see what we're doing, and the worth of it. You'd think they
liked
being yoked and driven by the magelords, the way they kick and snap when we free them. The Lady of Peace herself would be driven to fury, the way they are. By the gods, we're trying to make them free, and make things fair, and they won't see it!"

"We might as well
be
brigands," said Herrak. It was not the first time he'd said something like that, and Gird disliked the whine in his voice. "The way they are, what difference does it make?"

"It makes a difference to
us
," said Gird. "There were brigands before; they never helped the farmers. If we're only robbers, all should be against us. What I can't see is why
they
don't see the difference."

"We need to win," said Selamis, smiling. He had the honeysweet lilt to his voice that Gird hated; it worked on the crowds, most times, but it was not plainspeaking.

"What do you think, I should go to the brigands and recruit
them
?" He meant it as a jest, but the quality of the silence told him the others had thought of that before. Seriously. Selamis was paring his nails with a knife; he gave Gird that sideways look that Gird disliked.

"Some of them might be more like us than you think. Leaderless farmers thrown out of their villages—isn't that what you started with?"

Cob sat up straight and glared at Selamis. "We were not brigands. We may have been disorganized, lazy, filthy, and incompetent, but we were not brigands."

Selamis smiled at him. "That's what I meant. But your lord called you brigands, I'd wager." Cob was not mollified; he glowered at Selamis. But Ivis nodded.

"He did. And maybe—you were good with us, Gird, and if you found even another cohort by full spring—"

Gird mastered his anger with an effort. Late winter had always been the worst time for quarrels, even in the villages: empty bowls and enforced idleness made everyone irritable. "I suppose you have a particularly saintly brigand in mind for me to recruit?"

"I can't promise saintliness, but these last two villages both claim that the brigands near them muster a cohort or two. And there's a man who can guide you to their camp."

"I'll think about it." He would have thought about it between other things for a long time, but the next day a stranger came bearing an offer—written, Gird was surprised to see—from that very brigand captain. He had been a soldier, he said, and turned his coat when the war began. He had much to offer Gird, and would meet with him—in his camp. Gird talked to Arranha. The old priest shook his head and spread his hands.

"You put your life in the hands of Sier Segrahlin, Gird, and came out of that alive; if you want to chance this brigand I have no reason to think you'll do worse. Will you take a cohort of your own?"

"No. We don't have the food now to move them that far, and have them look like anything but starvelings. That won't impress him or his men. I'll go alone, and wear my best boots."

"You might like to consider something." The big man's face was dark with more than weather; ancient dirt outlined every crease, and his heavy dark hair was greasy. But the dagger with which he was paring his filthy nails was spotless, its edge gleaming.

"I might," said Gird, accepting the dirty clay pot one of the other men offered without enthusiasm. Gods only knew what kind of brew would be in it. He sniffed as unobtrusively as possible. The big man's shrewd eyes missed nothing.

"If you want ale, we've got it.
That's
just water—spring water, from over there." His head jerked, and Gird's eyes followed, to a glisten of water among rank weeds across the clearing. Gird sipped, cautiously. It tasted like spring water, untainted by any herbs he knew.