“Well, take care,” Tyrell warned me. “This is no place to get separated. I’m responsible for getting you to your brother, after all.”
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.” I acted so meek and contrite that Jasper laughed his metaphysical backside off. “Where to now?”
“There’s a general store yonder. We’ll stock up on a few necessities and make our way out of this mess.” He turned on Romulus. “And you listen to me good, boy. Lose her again and you’ll feel my boot. Understand?”
Romulus seemed to shrink to half his size, and this time I didn’t think it was an act. I felt for him, so lately a dog, then a slave, then free, and now being put back into bondage. Even if temporary, it had to hurt. I know it hurt me. He could only have felt it worse.
Hauling me up onto the horse to ride in front of him, whether I wanted to or not, Tyrell eased Al around a buggy and moved us toward the end of town. Jasper chattered about wanting to find some rabbits to pet next. I told him if we managed to save the world from all the evil sorcerers he could have a whole farm full of bunnies. An hour later, after buying some apples for his horse, sugar and flour for all, and stick candy for me, Tyrell had us back on the road again. Our travel day only half over, I settled in for the trip. Though I wanted to talk to Romulus about Roberta and Ernie, to see if they’d checked in the night before, the captain seemed determined to hang onto me. So I gave up and tried to relax on the hard saddle. I succeeded better than I’d have hoped, for soon I dozed off.
I jerked awake, having been in so sound a sleep that at first I thought morning had come already. Didn’t know where I was, either. After thrashing around for a minute, I got my bearings. It turned out that I lay in the dog tent again, pitched next to somebody’s big red barn. The comfortable smells of hay and manure pinched my nose. I made out the buzz of people talking, but they were too far away to understand actual words, even with my witched hearing. Alcibiades snorted right next to me someplace.
“It’s all right, miss,” said Romulus in a near-whisper. He crouched down at the tent’s opening. “We’s stopped fo’ the night. Cap’n sweet-talked the owner o’ this farm to let us stay here. A might better than roughin’ it like last night.”
Rubbing my eyes, I blinked and looked at him. Judging by the light it’d be dark in about two hours. “Holy cow…I’ve been asleep ever since Fredericksburg? That must be at least six hours.”
“Yes’m. Guess you needed it.”
He started to stand up, but I grabbed his shirt collar to keep him still. “Seen Roberta and Ernie? Did they show last night?”
“Just fo’ a second. Said they’d be back when you was awake. ’Round about three o’clock today I mirrored ‘em to meet us in the hayloft here just after sundown.”
“Mirrored ‘em? You know Morse code, too? Is there anything you Marshals can’t do?”
A corner of his mouth went up for a second. “We’s powerful bad dancers, mostly.”
I stretched and yawned. “Is that so?”
“Ernie’s of the opinion that he be the exception, of course.”
“Of course.” I crawled out of the tent and got to my feet for a look around. The house and buildings were in good shape, fresh-painted and well-maintained, but that was as far as it went. At one time the farm might’ve been a prosperous one, but it looked like the Rebel army had requisitioned—the military term for ‘stolen’—all of the livestock and a good part of the crops. The owner must not have been holding a grudge against the Confederate government if he’d offered hospitality to Tyrell. I noticed that his welcome didn’t go so far as letting us sleep in the house, though. “So where exactly are we?”
Romulus patted Alcibiades, who munched on one of the new apples. “Just north of Hanover Courthouse. Be in Richmond late tomorrow, I reckons.”
“That’ll be when things get serious.” We watched a column of gray-coated infantry march past the house as fast as their feet could carry them. They must’ve been in a heck of a hurry to get at McClellan, for not a one of them broke ranks to forage on the farm property. In a second they’d rounded a bend in the road and were gone. “We’ll need all of Roberta and Ernie’s help to find a way around those armies.”
“Should be easy once we gets past the Rebs,” chuckled Romulus. “They say Stuart’s cavalry rode all the way ‘round the whole blessed Federal army only ‘bout a week ago.”
I’d read that, too, in an anti-McClellan paper. Maybe it was true. In a perverse way that lifted my spirits. It sounded like we could find a way past them, then. Three people would have an easier time than thousands of horsemen. Unless McClellan had learned the error of his ways and had sealed the gaps.
Tyrell barked at us from a corner of the barn. “You, Tom! I thought I told you to get some hay for my horse?”
“Right on it, sir,” Romulus said, hurrying into the barn.
“Have to stay on them every second,” grumbled the captain. “Go to sleep at a dead run if you aren’t watchful. Anything to gum up the works of their betters.”
I couldn’t resist disagreeing. His attitude toward the colored folks annoyed me, though I had to be careful since Mary ought to share it. “Oh, I don’t know. Tom’s always been a hard worker for us. Perhaps you’re letting your past experiences cloud your judgment?”
He shook his head at the poor benighted child of privilege. “It’s good that you’re so forgiving, but in time you’ll learn that those who are too sweet get taken advantage of.” With that argument-ender he turned and strode off toward the farmhouse.
Jasper piped up as Tyrell vanished into the house. “I wonder how sweet the Hellfiend Legion thinks you are?”
I laughed out loud. “The feelin’s are mutual, I expect.”
“Speakin’ as the resident magick sword here…”
“Yeah?”
“Do you have an actual plan for gettin’ to the coast, or are we just gonna read a few tea leaves?”
“I dunno. If I drink the tea first will that earn me magick points?”
“Maybe if you pour some bourbon into it first. Laudanum! Laudanum would really charge me up.”
I snorted. “But it wouldn’t charge me up. I’m the one who’d float away on an opium cloud, mister. Don’t you have any wants that are safe for your lord and mistress?”
“Lord and mistress? Sounds like a cheap stage act. Magician and a monkey.”
“Yeah, but who is which? Come on, let’s go make supper…and a plan.”
21/ Trouble in Richmond
There’s an Assassins Guild? Murderers with their own trade union? Somehow that don’t surprise me. Probably a Loyal Order of Poisoners, too. And a Torturers’ Fraternal Association.
Sure enough, as soon as it got dark we had a reunion in the hayloft. Sailing in through the high hatch, Roberta landed on an oak beam to let Ernie scramble from her scarlet back and down to my knee. Romulus kept watch at the top of the ladder, but we weren’t much afraid that Tyrell would surprise us. After an actual hot meal, courtesy of the Grangerfords (owners of the property, whom he’d met and charmed some months earlier), the captain had declared it unnecessary to keep a watch that night. His trust of the Grangerfords meant that we were safe. Beds had been offered to us. He insisted that Romulus sleep outside, of course. I told him as Mary that I was having a fine adventure and would stay in the tent again like a real soldier. He took that as an indirect compliment and retired to cotton sheets and a down mattress.
“Nice digs,” squawked Roberta, eyeing the barn. “Better than berthin’ on the ground like before.”
Ernie agreed. “The barn mice like it here. Say the cat’s old and slow. Prefers to sleep in the house rather than earn his keep.”
“Course,” our parrot ally went on, “it can’t hold a candle to where we stayed last night.” She paused just enough to make me fidget.
“And that was where?” I asked her.
“State capitol dome,” Ernie announced with pride, running up Romulus to sit on his shoulder.
“Pige
ons scooted over for us,” Roberta explained. “Professional courtesy. Seems they’re neutral, war-wise.”
“You’ve been in Richmond already?” I asked, all a-twitter to know what lay ahead of us.
Ernie poked at Romulus’ blistered shoulder. “Sure thing. We’d be poor scouts if we hadn’t.” He looked hard at Romulus, then at me. “What happened?”
I waved his question off. “He took my foot blisters. What’s up in Richmond, then?”
Roberta itched her white cheek with a toe. “The Federal army’s only four miles east of town. Everybody’s runnin’ hither and yon like their pumps’ve stopped workin’, matey. Half the civilians’ve skedaddled already, and three-quarters of the rats, I might add.”
“Typical,” said Ernie, snapping his tail. “Bloody cowards. Give me a sturdy old mouse any day.”
“Town’s full o’ soldiers headin’ for the front. From what we hear this General Lee is gonna give McClellan a full broadside, before the same thing happens to him. Little Mac’s already shakin’ in his boots thinkin’ that he’s outnumbered. Seein’ enemy sails where none exist.”
I raised an eyebrow. “The pigeons told you all this?”
She peered regally at me through her spectacles. “What, you think they just sit around all day ploppin’ on statues?”
“Hey, ease up. A couple days ago I didn’t even know that animals could talk.”
“That’s all right, girlie,” Ernie laughed. “A couple o’ days ago we didn’t know humans could think.” Roberta found that funny, too. And I even heard Jasper snickering in my head for a second.
So there I sat, listening to a mouse and a parrot ridicule my species and give me left-handed compliments. Won’t this make for an odd memoir in my old age? They gave us some more detailed information about Jackson’s corps hustling from the Shenandoah Valley to flank McClellan, and about suspected positions of other Confederate and Union forces. Since brigades seemed to be shifting non-stop, though, that news was already out-of-date. We made plans for them to fly over us every two hours starting at noon the next day. I expected to get to the outskirts of town by late afternoon if we pushed it, which Tyrell could be counted on to do. By then I hoped we’d have enough good intelligence to decide how to get through or around the enormous masses of men in our way. If anything urgent needed to be communicated to us, Roberta said she’d send a robin friend of hers. Less likely to cause suspicion than a parrot in glasses carrying a mouse on its back, we all agreed.
Other than the roads being clogged with more bodies, civilian and military, than on the first two days of our trip, nothing much changed on Wednesday. Rested from my heroic afternoon nap and an uninterrupted night’s sleep, all cleaned up (an actual hot bath in the Grangerfords’ house! Woo!), and full of food from a real breakfast, I felt spry and saucy. Romulus seemed to have shrugged off the wound transfer already, although shrugging off Tyrell’s nasty comments looked to be more of a chore. Every step closer to Richmond worsened the Reb’s tone toward the Marshal, who stayed stoic and took it all. Me, I’d have knocked him off of his horse. Then again, I wouldn’t have been strung up from a tree by the locals for doing it, so maybe Romulus knew what he was about.
Jasper kept trying to get me to pilfer another cigar, but I made it very clear that I’d bathe in Washington Canal and arm-wrestle manure monsters before I ever smoked again. Nobody on the road wore their Sunday finery or their best perfume, so stranger-stroking or sniffing were out, too. I told him that if we got the chance in Richmond I’d get hold of some imported chocolate and gorge myself. Once I’d explained to him about chocolate (‘God’s apology for the flood’) he whooped for joy. For once I agreed with him.
Just after noon Romulus caught up with me. With a worried look on his sweaty face he whispered, “Trouble, I thinks.”
I gripped the cup where it hung on my belt. If he thought there was trouble I wanted to be ready for anything. “Where?”
“Not sure, but somethin’ don’t feel right. A darkness in the air, somehow.”
“Well, we’re in a war zone, you know.”
He shook his head, looking all around without trying to be obvious about it. “Ain’t that. More like Merchantry bizness. Your Stone’s still quiet?”
Touching my chest and feeling nothing cold there, I nodded. “Warm as toast.”
“Well, that’s somethin’. Expect ‘em to be mortals in daylight, anyways. ‘Specially with all o’ these witnesses.”
Now I was looking around and seeing nothing, too. “Stragglers from the Legion, maybe? That boss of theirs got away. Don’t how many of ‘em are left. Plenty of new deserters to refill their ranks these days, I expect.”
“Could be. But you oughta know, miss, that the Merchantry has its own renegades to watch out for.”
Huh? I’m only hearing about this now? “Say that again? Merchantry renegades? I thought they were this great well-oiled machine of world domination?”
“They is, but nothin’ that big can hold together perfect. They’s more than one opinion ‘bout just how to run that machine.”
“Dissension in their ranks?” That’s about the best news I’ve had all week. “Good news for us, right?”
Romulus nodded, squinting into the sky at a circling buzzard. “Yes, ma’am. Unless one o’ their rebel groups has taken it into they heads to snatch you befo’ you gets to London.”
“Whoa! That’d explain why Venoma told me to get to London on my own but the bad guys keep still attackin’ me. That bounty the Legion talked about might be from one of the dissenter groups. Makes sense, huh?”
He still watched that buzzard, which now swooped lower, right over my head. “It do, at that.”
I frowned at the big ugly bird. “That buzzard one of ‘em? You want me to get Tyrell to shoot it?”
Grabbing my arm hard, Romulus hissed in my ear, “No! That’s Lenny.”
“Lenny? He’s a friend of yours?” I could believe anything, after the talking tree.
“We used t’ work together…befo’.” Romulus had a faraway look in his eye. Must be rememberin’ the good old days, back when he could relax by the hearth and chew a nice bone.
“Uh…okay. Why’s he here?”
“That’s what I’s wonderin’. Might be lookin’ fo’ a rabbit. He sure do love his rabbits.” We followed Lenny’s flight, which went lower and lower. The giant bird raced along the ground to our left, just off of the road. His talons, bigger than my own hands, snatched at something in the grass. Those huge wings beat the shimmery summer air and lifted the buzzard back up high. A large wriggling snake, a venomous copperhead, struggled to free itself from his grip.
“Good ol’ Lenny,” smiled Romulus. “Lookin’ out fo’ us, he is.”
As he spoke good old Lenny tore the snake in two with one easy snap of his good old beak. After watching the pieces fall to earth he circled over us one more time. I swear it looked like he saluted us. Then he waggled his wings and disappeared to the south, where his normal prey would soon be lying in the sun, full of bullet holes.
“I suppose that wasn’t just some poor innocent snake that just happened to be mindin’ its own business?” I asked.
“No. You kin always tell. If he eats ‘em, they’s just food. If he kills ‘em and leaves ‘em, they’s enemies.”
Great. A buzzard with standards. “So now I have to worry about every livin’ thing around me?”
“Not just now. You always had to worry ‘bout that. And Bullies. And Venoma. And mortal bounty hunters. And maybe the Assassins Guild, too.”
There’s an Assassins Guild? Murderers with their own trade union? Somehow that don’t surprise me. Probably a Loyal Order of Poisoners, too.And a Torturers’ Fraternal Association.
“That’s just wonderful. Remind me again who all is actually on our side?”
Romulus gave me a grim smile. “Pretty much the whole world, miss. They’s just too ‘fraid to show it. That’s why you’s here. To give ‘em courage.”
Oh, so i
t’s the blind leadin’ the blind. At least I know where I stand…underneath a giant burden of ‘save humanity or else’, that’s where.
“Wait a minute. You say I’ve always had to worry about things bein’ out to get me. You mean that literal-like, don’t you? Like since I was born?” He didn’t reply, just looked at me as if I were a drooling idiot, which I guess I was back then. “So that must also mean that I’ve been watched over my whole life, too? By who? I don’t remember seein’ any guards.”
“That’s the idea. We wanted you to grow up normal.”
That made me see red. “Normal? Movin’ from our farm in the dead o’ night, with just the clothes on our backs? Growin’ up with no Pa? That’s normal?”
Romulus didn’t look at me, but stared straight ahead as he walked. “Couldn’t be helped. We tried to stop it, but…”
Stop what? Does everybody know the details of my life except me? “Then you do know what happened to Pa? Tell me! Ma won’t say a word about it.”
“Ain’t my place to say.”
“Well, whose place is it?”
I’d gotten pretty hot about the whole thing, and loud, too, I guess. Tyrell eased Alcibiades over and almost casually kicked Romulus with the side of his boot. “Say, boy, you’re upsettin’ Miss Mary. Get along up front and shut your mouth.”
Without another word Romulus picked up his pace and moved past the captain about thirty feet. Tyrell stared down from his giant golden horse. Al just snuffled at me, hoping to find an apple. Both of them had a disappointed look. “What was that about?”
I reeled myself back into my role as Mary. Gritting my teeth, I said, “Just a little lesson on respect, is all. He’ll be all right now.” Sorry, Romulus.
“In my experience they remember their lessons best if you use a whip. I’d be happy to---“
“No!” Oops, that came out too strong. I took a breath. “No. Papa always used to refuse to beat the hands. Said it just made ‘em more resentful. We treat ‘em like simple-minded children. Seems to work better.”
Brimstone and Lily (Legacy Stone Adventures) Page 21