Two of them circled the camp and took up a position on the other side. Four of them prepared to rush the camp, making enough noise for ten. The rest of the scouts veered to the right, the direction the remainder of the Descendant guards were likely to come from once they heard the commotion.
As soon as they heard the boisterous frontal attack, the guards at the camp bolted away in the opposite direction. The two squad members waiting for them stepped out from cover, took them head high, and slammed them down on their backs. The guards were immobilised as they tried to sit up and regain their breath.
A brief skirmish ensued as three more guards burst into the camp to see what the noise was about. They rushed straight into a number of the militia who were waiting for them.
These three had barely been disarmed when a line of guards, in protective leather gear and fully armed with swords and wooden shields, stepped into the clearing.
“Back up,” shouted Menon sharply. Hell’s teeth, he thought, where had this lot come from? They must be the full complement of guards who escaped from Harrow’s Crossing, not just a few stragglers.
“Orderly retreat,” cried Metris, spearing the sword arm of an attacking guard who had overextended his reach. The guard dropped out of the fight, a damaged arm held against his side while he cursed vigorously, but two more took his place.
Menon saw the squad being overrun on both sides, and called to them to fall back further. They did so, but the guards sensed they had the advantage now, and pressed home their attack. The militia were getting the better of the furious exchange, but it was too late for them to break free. They were completely surrounded.
Metris led a desperate charge to the right, and they almost broke through the surrounding cordon. The fighting was fierce, but they were finally herded back toward the middle of the clearing. Menon repulsed a guard and glanced quickly over his shoulder.
He saw that two of his squad were seriously wounded, and he knew the militia must eventually be overwhelmed by sheer force of numbers. The guards didn’t seem keen to press their advantage, and Menon was about to use the moment to surrender when something caught him a tremendous blow on the side of the head. Everything went black.
When he came to there was an angry exchange of words going on a short distance away.
“Leave’m here,” snarled a furious voice. “Look what they did to Heinkel. Blasted Sea People gutted every Descendant at Saintsborough, you know that. Cut these’m throats and leave’m to feed the scavengers. Remember, a life for a life!”
Menon realised the little scheme the militia had engineered at Saintsborough, to present themselves as murderous cut-throats and scare the Descendants all the way back to Roum, might be about to work against them. He tried to move his hands, but they were securely tied.
“Partheni wants prisoners, and tha’s an end of it,” rumbled a voice carrying much more authority. There was a moment’s charged silence.
“Look, I know you lost good friends in the fight wi’ this lot,” continued the more senior voice, “but they lost men too. It’s wha’ happens in a skirmish like this.”
Then it continued, with a hint of malevolence, “they’ll suffer enough before Partheni’s finished with’m, you can count on that.”
There was a snort of laughter as the other speaker moved away.
Partheni! Menon’s heart raced. Maybe he would have his revenge on the tribunal chairman yet. He couldn’t forget the black-hearted murder of the two villagers at Saintsborough. But first he had to escape, or did he?
No, it would be better to let himself and the others be taken back to Roum as prisoners. Partheni would be waiting there with the rest of the Descendants, preparing to meet the militia on home ground.
Menon moved his head cautiously. His head felt bruised and bloody along the right side, but he didn’t feel faint. He guessed he hadn’t lost too much blood. He looked around, and Metris caught his eye and winked slowly. The Shellport man was letting him know he was conscious, and relatively unharmed.
There were several still forms lying on the ground further over, and it was hard to tell if they were alive or dead. Still, they were too few to make up a full squad, so they were probably those of his men who were still alive – with those that were dead left on the battlefield.
Menon put his head down again before he was noticed by the guards. The main body of the Shellport militia would fear the worst when the scouts didn’t return in a day or two, but they would find signs of the skirmish soon enough as they came through.
Hudnee and Habna would figure out that if they weren’t among the dead, and they hadn’t managed to rejoin the militia, they must have been taken captive.
For the first time in a long while, it began to rain softly. Menon didn’t even notice. If they could get inside Roum, he thought, and kill Partheni, and maybe generate some sort of rebellion from within. His thoughts petered out, but he knew it would aid the militia cause enormously. A dangerous smile started to move, slowly, across his face.
Half a day later Menon was cupping a wooden bowl as best he could with his hands bound at the wrists. The food was a simple stew of grains and tubers mixed with a scant smattering of dried herd beast meat, and the fact it contained meat was a marvel in itself. If there was herd beast meat in the stew, it meant the Descendants had managed to keep some of the large work animals alive through the rains. That was quite an achievement.
Menon had noted animal sign on the ground, and on the bark of trees, while the squad had been scouting toward Harrow’s Crossing. He had been gratified to see some of the animals of Hud were still alive. It was a miracle any had survived the rotting vegetation and long quadroons of rains. Those that had survived would be in ones and twos only. Certainly nothing that should yet be hunted for meat.
The stew was a good sign that the prisoners were getting treated reasonably well. The guard Menon thought of as Gravel Voice did at least feed his captives a basic ration. He knew that some of the other guards would as soon kill them and leave them on the side of the trail, in retaliation for Descendant losses at Harrow’s Crossing and the previous day’s skirmish in the woods.
Menon sighed. Both sides had lost men, and he didn’t find the deaths of two of the Shellport squad easy to bear. Metris had taken it particularly hard. These were the first deaths while he had been in command. He had just been promoted to lead his own squad, and the fates had given him no time to prepare for one of the hardest tasks a leader ever faced.
Two more of the squad had serious wounds, which Menon had treated as best he could. Thank the gods of healing he had been collecting medicine plants before they ran into the Descendant guards retreating from Harrow’s Crossing. The wounded squad members had so far been able to keep up as the guards and their captives marched toward Roum.
Somewhere behind them the Shellport militia would finally be making contact with the southern militia. The combined force, swollen with villagers from the lands they had liberated, and a growing number of Descendants who had proved they’d had had a change of heart, could not be more than a day’s march behind them.
Menon knew that short distance would not last. The provisioning and maintaining of orderly progress for the militia would slow them down considerably. The Descendant guards and the remaining members of Metris’ squad would be in Roum days before the militia arrived. If he wanted to get word back to the others about their circumstances, he would have to engineer something himself.
That was going to be a challenge!
CHAPTER 21
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Menon finished the stew in his bowl and spoke in a low voice to Metris.
“How are Demarc and Leran doing?”
“Leran is not good,” came Metris’ equally soft reply. “He’s lost a lot of blood, and he’s struggling with that broken arm.”
If Leran could rest, and eat a little better than this, thought Menon, he would recover a lot better. The bitter lacemoss Menon had packed around his wounds had stopped i
nfection, but that wasn’t enough. Leran wasn’t going to make it to Roum if they kept up this pace, and if he couldn’t keep up, Gravel Voice would give the order to have him killed.
In the same way that the squad had tried to stop the Descendant guards from making it to Roum, and increasing the defense forces there, Gravel Voice couldn’t let Leran go. Given a few weeks to recover, he would be one more attacker at the walls of Roum. The same brutal laws applied to both sides.
That left Menon with a question. What could he do to save Leran’s life?
When his own thoughts proved unproductive, he told Metris what he was thinking. They had to talk in whispers, making sure the guards weren’t taking an interest in them.
Metris was silent for a long time. Then he asked a couple of strange questions. Menon wondered what he had in mind.
Finally Metris put forward the bare bones of a rather innovative plan. Menon had to hide a smile, and more than that he had to hide his feelings. Metris’ plan was so bold he wanted to laugh at its sassiness. But more than that, the young man was turning into a leader before his eyes.
Metris’ first mission with a squad of his own had turned into a disaster, with the loss of two of its members, but that had spurred him on to do better. It had brought out the understanding of people, and of situations, that he needed if he was to be a good leader. Balancing the risk to the squad to save one of their number was part of that understanding.
What Metris proposed would put the whole squad in danger, but it might just save Leran’s life. Menon added more details to the plan, and then they settled down for the night. If their plan looked as good in the morning as it did right now, they would be taking action before the midday halt tomorrow.
“Get’m sad sack arse off’n ground,” snarled a voice the next morning, and a boot crashed into Menon’s side. He was already awake, and he rolled away from his attacker. Then he turned to see who it was. He slid one knee under himself and came up balanced, ready for any further violence.
It was the same guard he had heard talking to Gravel Voice, the one wanting to kill them all and leave their bodies on the side of the track. For a moment he thought of doing the guard some real damage, but then he remembered his long-term plan. Menon wanted to get to Roum, and he wanted to find out where Partheni was. This mindless bully was just a means to an end.
The guard must have seen the look in Menon’s eyes, because he moved back a step. Bolstering his nerve with more bluster and curses, he spat on the ground and waved ahead on the trail.
“Get’m useless carcass up wit’others, we be moving out!”
Then he stomped off.
Menon looked around. There was a layer of mist over the trees, trapped within the hills around them, and he could see people moving in the gloom. It must be after sunrise, but the darkness of the mist had confused his sense of time.
By his reckoning, considering what the southern militia scout had told him, the column should come down out of the hills soon, and onto the plains surrounding Roum. Before the squad left the hills they had to put Metris’ plan into effect. It was the only way Leran would have a chance of escaping, and resting up somewhere while he healed.
Metris tapped Menon’s elbow as the Shellport squad got into line. It was the signal the men had been briefed and everything was in place. Now they just had to find the right spot to execute their plan. The squad’s hands were bound for the day’s march, a new development, but they should still be able to free Leran.
By the time of the mid-morning break, nothing had turned up in the countryside they passed through that they might be able to use. But a little later on they followed the trail under a line of cliffs. This, thought Menon, was much better.
He pretended to swallow an insect, and made a show of coughing it up. This was the agreed signal, and it wasn’t long before Menon heard the mumble of voices from some scrub at the base of the cliffs. It sounded like two men arguing, and then it ceased abruptly, as if they had heard the arrival of the Descendant guards.
Menon had to admire Metris’ skill. The younger man had discovered early in life that he could bounce his voice around to startle game in the direction he wanted it to run. That way he could get a better shot at it with his sling. Since then he had developed the technique considerably.
Gravel Voice had heard the noises, and he motioned a handful of men toward the cliffs. As soon as the guards had left the column, more voices started up, this time from the woods on the other side. There was never more than one at a time, but they kept coming from different directions.
Menon looked at Leran, who nodded imperceptibly. He had been examining the line of scrub under the cliffs, and seen a spot where hard ground and good cover should leave no tracks as he escaped and provide him with a hiding place. The only thing he needed now was for Metris’ plan to give him the chance.
Gravel Voice had decided the column was getting surrounded by bandits, and he moved the column off the trail and into the trees where they wouldn’t get trapped against the cliffs by an attacking force. A number of the guards formed a perimeter, while two small groups were dispatched to find out who the intruders were.
Meanwhile Menon, Leran and a few others of the Shellport squad had dropped back a little, until they were close to the edge of the column. Once Metris saw they were in place, he dropped to the ground and began to thrash around, spitting and stuttering.
It was the best impression of a mental fit he could muster, and it drew the attention of most of the guards. They were already nervous about everything as they wondered what sort of armed force was circling them under cover of the trees.
As soon as Metris began his diversion, Menon and the others burst out of the column between two of the perimeter sentries. They bolted into the forest, splitting up and changing directions. For a few moments pandemonium reined.
To Menon it was a grand game of tag, the same game he had played with his friends in the shallows of the Kapuas river at Shellport. He ducked, spun, and dodged behind trees, covering the same ground again and again as he tried to “escape” from the guards. The others were doing the same, and in the confusion Leran made his way swiftly to the hiding place he had spotted before vanishing from sight.
In the end the Shellport men who had tried to escape were herded back into the column. They had been careful to give themselves up before they took any serious damage. Metris had a scrape on one shoulder from the flat of a sword, and he suspected the others would be nursing minor injuries as well.
They might have pulled it off – five of the militia had made a break for it, and only four had come back – but for the vigilance of the Descendant captain at the head of the column. When the voices in the woods had ceased, and the guards sent out to investigate had returned with nothing, the captain reformed the column. As an afterthought he sent a guard back to check on his captives. There was an uproar when it was discovered one of them was missing.
Metris was the squad leader, and he bore the brunt of the Descendant captain’s wrath. Menon struggled not to interfere as Metris was beaten and kicked until he sank to the ground unconscious.
There was nothing Menon could do, even if his hands had not been bound, in the middle of so many armed guards. But he knew there would come a time when the Descendant captain would pay for the beating. It was a malicious act, born of frustration and lack of control. It wasn’t worthy of a leader and it was a poor example to the others.
The squad members hurried to get Metris back on his feet. He was young and fit, and seemed to have survived the vicious attack without too much damage. He was shaken by it, and he was limping from where he had been kicked, but he was able to continue the march when the column moved off again.
Menon gave him some leaves to chew on that would reduce the pain. The bruising would have to take its normal course and fade over time.
The column began to slow as the trail wound downhill, parts of it scoured out by the rains, and Menon offered his shoulder for Metris to hook an elbo
w over. A little help would ease the leg he was limping on, and it was the best Menon could do with both their hands bound.
It began to drizzle lightly, and the clouds kept the midday heat off them. As they moved awkwardly down the trail Menon began to think about the squad’s situation.
What would be their next course of action? Roum was only be a day away at the most. What could they hope to achieve once they were inside those massive gates?
Menon hoped Leran had his hands free by now. There were rocks scattered along the base of the cliff, and breaking one against another should produce some shards that would cut through his bindings. If he could find water and rest up, he should be doing okay when the militia came through the hills in a few days time.
Menon turned his mind back to the descent off the hills and settled into a steady rhythm, taking Metris’ weight while he was using his damaged leg. Once that rhythm was established he turned his thoughts to Roum again.
Menon’s plans depended on the squad being kept together, but if that didn’t happen, how would he find them if they were split up? Assuming they were all together, what could they do to prepare for the assault on Roum by the militia?
CHAPTER 22
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Menona sat in the front of the supply wagon, and gazed in wonder at the sea of rough shelters that had sprung up in the wide valley where the Shellport militia and the southern militia had met. Daneesa sat beside her, though her concern was more for the labourers that toiled in double rows to bring the wagon, and others like it, to the militias.
Hudnee had recruited the labourers at the last town the militia had freed from the Descendants. He had recognised the abandoned foundations of a new pilar of worship in the town, and managed to assemble nearly half of the labourers that had worked on the pilar before the rains came.
The men had quickly recognised a master builder in Hudnee, and pledged an allegiance to him, and his intent to free Hud from Descendant control. The first thing Hudnee had asked them to do was bring up wagons filled with supplies from Saintsborough, the last place on the Kapuas that the Sea People could reach in their dooplehuels and drop off supplies.
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