by Glen Cook
“They knew their families?”
“I never heard anything said otherwise.”
Aaron sighed a sigh that started right down in the roots of his soul. There was something to hang on to and nurture.
“Good, then,” Billygoat said. “And what else do you have on your mind this morning, young man?” Part of Billygoat’s charm was his assumption of the old man’s role, though he was far from elderly.
Aaron was startled. Was he that obvious when he was troubled?
“Yep. The old man’s a mind reader. What the hell did you expect, Aaron, moping around here all morning? Nobody pays attention? Come on. Spit it out.”
“It isn’t that easy, Billygoat. It’s one of those things where you’ve got to make a choice, and even ignoring it is a choice, and no matter what you choose somebody is going to get hurt. So what you have to do is pick who gets it.”
“Yeah. Those kind are a blue-assed baboon bitch, ain’t they? Homar, it’s time you broke. You’re getting tired and sloppy trying to keep up. I see a couple places you’re going to have to do over.”
Aaron couldn’t see anything wrong with Homar’s work. Neither could Homar, he suspected, but Billygoat’s assistant cleaned his tools, put more charcoal on, broke up a couple of pitch billets and put them in to melt, then went away.
“So, Aaron. Let’s talk about it.”
“What do you know about the Living?”
Billygoat’s eyes got wary. “As little as I can. Knowing too much could get you a chance to swim across the bay with a hundred pounds of rocks tied to your toes.”
“Yeah.” He hadn’t thought of that angle. “What I meant was, are they something worthwhile, or are they just a bunch of diehards making it rougher for the rest of us?”
Billygoat smiled. “You don’t get me that easy, Aaron. It’s in the eye of the beholder. Why don’t you lay out the problem and if I see something I’ll say so and if I don’t I’ll forget you even asked.”
Aaron thought about it a minute, but there was not much going on inside his head. All he wanted to do was puke it up, get it out of his gut before it poisoned him.
“Say there was a guy who betrayed Qushmarrah in a way that was just as important as what Fa’tad did, only hardly anybody noticed, and only one guy knew, and the traitor didn’t know he knew, and one day years later suddenly it looked like the traitor was now somebody real important in the Living. If he worked for the Herodians before...”
“I see.” Billygoat raised a hand for silence. He had stopped working. “Say no more.” He turned inward for several minutes. Then, “With the years intervening there would have grown up knots of personal considerations and complications, not so? The fight for Qushmarrah is over and lost. The traitor probably has a family now, all completely innocent, who would suffer terribly from any belated justice. Yet if he were indeed high in the councils of the Living, and still a tool of Herod, and the Living are a worthy group of men with a real chance of restoring Qushmarrah’s independence and glory... Yes sir, Aaron, truly a blue-assed bitch baboon of a problem.”
Someone up top yelled at Aaron to come on. The men on the hoist were ready to lower the mast step.
“I’ll think about this, Aaron. For every no-win situation I’ve ever seen there’s always been an extra way out if you could just back off and look at the whole map from a skewed angle. Talk to me later. Get up there before they get pissed.”
“Thanks, Billygoat.” Aaron trotted to the nearest scaffolding, clambered up, crossed the ship on a work deck of loose planks, checked that everything he had brought up earlier was still handy. His helpers were ready. “Lower away!”
The step assembly came down slowly. The men helping turned it, aligned it, guided it into place. Aaron beckoned the foreman. “It looks like a good fit. But let’s check the join points to make sure.”
Ten minutes later he was puffed with pride. Only one place did he need to plane a bit offa beam end. Cullo told him, “You have to stay in this business, Aaron. We’d get the contracts filled in half the time.”
Aaron shrugged, went to the side, had the men on the hoist lift the assembly a foot and a half. His helpers started brushing all the join points with adhesive. He let it set up a little, then had the assembly dropped into place again. His helpers started driving adhesive-soaked pegs immediately, four to the join, of which there were twelve: four at deck level, two to the side; four halfway down a pair of the midships ribs, two to the side again; and four on the keel itself.
“A successful experiment,” the foreman told Aaron. “It’s saved us a week over putting it together in place, piece by piece. I’m sure you’ll get a fat bonus. How soon can you start on the steps for the cargo booms?”
“I still have to finish this. After the glue seasons I have to cut the pegging flush, sand the joins smooth, layer on some more glue, then cover everything with lacquer.”
“All stuff that could be done by somebody else, under your supervision, while you’re getting the other steps. What the hell is going on?”
Men were gathering in the bow of the unfinished ship, chattering and pointing toward the harbor. Aaron followed the foreman forward to see what was up.
A huge galley was working her way in. She wore the gaudiest sail Aaron had ever seen. “Who is it?”
“Must be the new civil governor. Early. And now everything goes to hell while we fake up celebrations to show him how overjoyed Qushmarrah is that he’s finally come.”
Aaron leaned on the rail, watching the Herodian galley, and smiled slightly, remembering how cynical his father had been about government and those who governed.
Bel-Sidek was hard at it, holystoning the foredeck of a tubby merchantman out of Pella, a Herodian tributary where friends of the Living worked the docks. Behind him, stevedores shuffled to the dock and back aboard, loading and unloading at the same time.
Sacks of something were going off and sacks of something else were coming on and bel-Sidek could not quite see the point because he could not distinguish one group of sacks from the other. But inside a few of those coming off there would be lethal tools for the Living.
Someone hailed him from the dock. The voice was breathless. For a moment he feared it was going to be a warning that the customs goons were coming and he would have to get his men scattered before they could be identified. But when he got to the rail he saw one of that very select group of men entrusted with carrying messages between the khadifas. The man pointed toward the bay and shouted, “The new governor’s ship is coming in.”
Bel-Sidek cursed and signaled his understanding. “Early. The bald-headed little bastard would get here early.” He tried to look for the ship but all he could see in that direction was the tips of the lighthouses atop the Brothers. The Pellans had taken the cheapest commercial wharfage available. That put them behind a jungle of masts and spars belonging to Qushmarrah’s fishermen and sponge and pearl divers. And small-time smugglers. If there was any distinction between the bunch.
He limped off the ship and got himself to the nearest height where he could see the harbor. After a minute he began to chuckle. Other gawkers looked him askance. He controlled himself.
The governor’s ship and two fast war galleys escorting her had bulled their way past commercial traffic beyond the Brothers and now several delayed vessels were coming in behind them. Including Meryel’s two ships with the arms down in their holds. There would be no trouble getting them off-loaded and safely away. The whole Herodian colony would be going crazy and would cease to function for a few days.
Would the old man take the opportunity to welcome the new tyrant? He had before. But if Meryel was right and there was some special operation shaping... Could it have something to do with the new governor? Doubtful. The General had talked in terms of months.
Might as well go back to work. The governor’s arrival would make no difference in his life, at least today.
As he was passing the new shipyards, put up where the old public baths had s
tood till they had been demolished because they offended Herodian morality, a man fell into step beside him. “So. Billygoat. Haven’t seen you in a while. What’s up? What’re you doing these days?”
“Working in the shipyard. As if you didn’t know.”
Bel-Sidek did know. He kept track of those few of his men who had come home from Dak-es-Souetta. “What is it?”
“The younger men there, they bring me their problems. I had a beauty turn up today. You were the only one I could think of who could maybe help solve it. And like a gift from Aram, here you are. I saw you, it was like a command from the gods.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Wait till I explain. I don’t know if you’re connected or not, but you’re the only one I could think of who might know somebody involved with the Living.”
Bel-Sidek did not respond.
“One of the guys-certainly not connected in any way-has convinced himself he knows the identity of a Qushmarrahan who was as guilty of treason during the war as al-Akla. He kept it to himself. But now he’s stumbled across something to make him think the traitor is in a high place in the Living. He fears that once in Herodian pay, always bought.”
“Eh!” Bel-Sidek rolled it around in his mind, a small part of him hoping he wasn’t sweating, blanching, or otherwise giving himself away. “Exactly what do you want, Sergeant?”
“Mainly, I want to figure out if the guy is imagining things. He believes it, but people believe impossible things every day. I never heard of any traitor but al-Akla. I sure as hell ain’t heard of one that was as important as him in how things came out.”
“I know of no such man myself but that doesn’t mean one didn’t exist. Come. I’ll buy you a lunch while we let reason gnaw at this.” Bel-Sidek suspected he had given himself away but had a feeling the risk would be worthwhile.
“I won’t name you any names, Colonel.”
You will, my friend. You will if we want you to. He glanced at the man. And maybe you wouldn’t. You were always a stubborn bastard.
“We’ll set the hounds of reason loose first, eh?”
They went into a place that served good bheghase, a thick and spicy fish and vegetable soup into which the fish was introduced two minutes before serving. It was an indulgence bel-Sidek allowed himself too seldom.
He savored a few mouthfuls before saying, “Granting that no names need be named, I’ll have to have a clue or two with which to work. Is your friend a veteran?”
“Who isn’t?”
“A point. Not many. Dak-es-Souetta?”
“No.”
“Ah. Now we’re getting somewhere. A vet, but not of Dak-es-Souetta. Works in a shipyard. Must be a building tradesman. Most of those were in the field engineer outfits assigned to the Seven Towers. I presume he knows about whatever because he saw it happen. If it happened.” He looked at Billygoat.
“You fishing for an opinion?”
“Yes.”
“He believes it, like I said. If he hadn’t sounded like a man trying to carry an unbearable load I wouldn’t be here.”
“The Seven Towers. I’ll have to research it. The Herodians had me in chains while that was happening.”
“I can suggest what to look for.”
“Uhm?”
“The Seven Towers were supposed to hold out long enough for the allies, the reserves, and the survivors of Dak-es-Souetta to assemble on the Plain of Chordan. But they didn’t.”
“Could one traitor have been the reason the strategy didn’t work?”
Billygoat shrugged. “I was five men down the chain from you.”
“I’ll find out. I’ll ask someone who was there. Thank you, Sergeant. Enjoy the bheghase.” Bel-Sidek limped away hurriedly, headed for the Pellan merchantman. Two of the men on his
stevedore crew had fought at the Seven Towers. One had been an officer, a military engineer.
He rounded the two up. “Take an early lunch.”
One man, bel-Pedra, depended entirely upon his income from stevedoring. “We’re liable to get fired.” There were limits to the sacrifices you could ask.
“I’ll take care of it.”
“What’s going on, sir?”
“I’ve just discovered that I need some background about the Seven Towers and what happened there. Something’s come up where it could be important for me to know. Malachi?”
Malachi was the man who had not yet spoken. He got off the bale where he had been seated, settled on the battered timber decking of the pier. “You’ve been through the pass, sir?”
“Never. We went out along the coast road.”
“Yes. Demolishing the bridges behind you so the enemy, if victorious, had to come to Qushmarrah through the hills.”
“Do I detect a critical note?”
“Call it a disgruntled note, sir. For five generations that was the strategy. But when it was put to the test it didn’t work.”
“It should have.”
“In theory.” Malachi used a finger to sketch an imaginary chart. “The road runs into the pass heading due east but when it gets to the crest it elbows sixty degrees south. There are four towers on the outside of this curve, two on either side of the summit. Three on the inside curve, with the middle perched on the crest. No names, just numbers, with the odds to the outside, evens in, counting from the far end. Number Four is the keystone piece. It’s three times as big and defensible as the others.
“Note the angular relationships between the towers. When all seven are intact only One and Seven have much of a shadow where they don’t get supporting fire from the other towers. That isn’t big enough to exploit well. Four has no shadow at all.
“Interesting from your professional viewpoint, I’m sure,” bel-Sidek said. “What went wrong?”
“I don’t know. We took away every option but reducing the towers in series.”
“Sounds like the hard way.”
“Hard, but the cheapest way for them. Also the slowest, which is why we wanted them to do it that way. Their sappers and engineers were good, but we made them pay dear to take One, Two, and Three. What happened later I don’t know. I was in Three.”
“Bel-Pedra?” bel-Sidek asked.
“I was in Five, sir. I don’t think I can help much. They went after Four like lions for three days and didn’t get nothing but bloody noses. Then the sun comes up on the fourth morning and there’s the Herodian standard showing up top and heralds down front telling us they’d make us rich if we’d just open up. We dumped the toilet pails on them and they went away. Five minutes later we were taking fire from the heavy engines on top of Four. Whatever happened, the guys there never had time to destroy those.”
Bel-Sidek pursued that tale a little, not because he was interested but because he did not want his next question to sound especially important. He got the two men to discuss Herodian tactics in the assaults on the various towers. Then he asked Malachi, “Did they try to get Three to surrender before they attacked?”
“Oh, they tried that with everybody. A matter of form. They have some kind of law. They got the same answer every time, and they expected it.”
“Uhm. Bel-Pedra, you’d better get back to work. Malachi, I have a chore for you.” He let bel-Pedra depart. “Go over to the new Herodian shipyard and find Bhani Sytef. You want a list of all employees who were at the Seven Towers. You want to know which tower they served in. He’s supposed to know things like that, but with so many working there I’d be astonished if he actually did. Just get a list of those he does know about. If it isn’t enough I’ll get back to him.”
Malachi rose. He looked puzzled. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know. But the big boys are trying to connect some people up with some other people and the only lead they’ve got is that maybe these guys were all in the same outfit at the Seven Towers.”
Bel-Sidek was well known to the Living in his quarter, but very few knew him to be khadifa of the waterfront. At every level he appeared as the agent of
the men a step or two up the chain of command. There were risks. Bel-Sidek felt having access to all his men all the time was worth those risks. The harbor quarter was the busiest for the Living and needed the most direct attention.
They want to ask people from outside the movement first?”
Bel-Sidek shrugged. “I don’t decide how things get done, I just do the job.”
“Nothing ever changes, does it?”
“Not in the army.”
Malachi left. And he returned much sooner than bel-Sidek expected.
“You were wrong, sir. He knew them well. There were only three men he couldn’t pin down for sure.” He proffered a piece of paper.
“I’ll see that he gets a commendation. Back to work. I fixed you with the Pellans.”
Bel-Sidek settled and ran a finger down the list. His finger jerked. “I should’ve guessed.” And it all fell into place, right along with the solution. He wanted to run to the General immediately. But he still had to assemble the gangs to work Meryel’s ships.
The new governor’s galley was trying to warp into its pier and having a hell of a time even with help from several tugs. Bel-Sidek smiled and murmured, “I hope that breeze is an omen.”
Medjhah shaded his eyes and peered at the harbor. “Ships coming in. Fancy ones.”
Yoseh yanked his attention away from the girl’s house. Medjhah pointed.
Three ships were crossing the slice of harbor visible from Char Street. “Warships?”
“The two on the outside. Must be somebody important.”
“Ferrenghi, probably.”
It took Medjhah a few seconds to get it. “Yeah. They all think they’re big stuff, don’t they?”
Yoseh’s attention drifted back to that doorway. The girl was mere again. And the old woman was giving him a truly ferocious look.
He felt puckish. He winked at her.
She was astonished. She was scandalized. Then, for an instant, a smile threatened to crack the dried mud of her face. Then she became more the basilisk than ever.
“Now what the hell?” Medjhah grumbled.
A dozen Dartar horsemen were hastening down the hill, speaking to the men at each entrance of the maze. Each pause caused an immediate stir. Yoseh guessed, “Fa’tad is calling us in for some reason.”