The old warrior leant to the side and spat on the dry ground dismissively. ‘More times than I would have liked. Two major routes, north-south and east-west, meet here, so it holds an important position, and don’t they know it. Still, passing through has been a necessity before, and it’s a necessity now. Might as well get it over with.’
The others readied themselves to move. Most were still mounted, but Brann’s pack had worked loose in its bindings and its rhythmic bumping against him for the past few miles had been irritating him, so he had slipped to the ground to take the chance to secure it more tightly. Grakk also was on his feet, picking a stone from his horse’s hoof, and Brann cast an eye over the road ahead. They were on the highest point and it undulated through a series of ever-lower rises until it met the floor of the plain. On the next rise, a man struggled alone to fix a cart that had lost a wheel. Brann nodded in his direction. ‘Looks like he could do with a hand.’ He glanced at Cannick. ‘I know you want to get in and out of this place as quickly as we can, and pick up Loku’s trail as soon as possible if he has indeed passed this way, but it wouldn’t take us long if it isn’t too badly damaged.’
The broad shoulders shrugged. ‘We are passing that way anyway. We can see when we get there.’ He kicked his horse forward without hesitation, accepting Brann’s opinion.
Brann swung himself into the saddle, his mail shirt clinking slightly as he did so. The pain from his ribs irked him more than that from his arm, not only because it hurt however he moved but also because it was a reminder of the folly of charging unprotected into a battle where blows will come from all unseen angles. Although ironically, he mused, had he not suffered wounds enough to render him unconscious, he would probably have fought on to his death. Still, he had donned his mail at the first stop to water the horses after Hakon had recounted his story, hot sun or no hot sun.
His hands automatically checked the helmet, shield, and bow hanging at vantage points around his saddle, and eased his sword in its scabbard, while his eyes fixed themselves on the scene at the cart. His gaze flicked to the area around it, searching for any sign of movement or disturbed wildlife, but his attention was mainly on the working man. Just because the distant figure had his back to them didn’t mean he was unaware of their presence. And just because he worked alone didn’t mean he was alone. Brann watched the man through the shimmering of the hot air, and continued to watch as they moved forward, waiting for a telltale glance towards hidden companions, or even the unnatural pretence of remaining oblivious to them beyond the point where he could not have failed to notice their approach.
His mind settled comfortably into the watchfulness. He felt happier to be putting more thought into a situation as opposed to reacting in line with the impetuous side that had been born in the pits of the City Below; born, admittedly, as a necessity in an environment where stopping to think was the first short stride in a one-step march to death. Thinking was a small sign that his darker side was not extending its control, but it was a small sign that he grasped and held tightly.
They moved at a trot, not wishing to move any faster lest it seem too aggressive. Brann’s eyes continually scanned for movement or shining metal in the area around, returning always to the man, but all that he could see was a carter labouring over a repair in the mid-day heat, the cargo, four large barrels, standing at the side of the road. When they were two bowshots away, the man straightened and turned, his face scarlet with effort and awash from pate to waist in sweat. If it was a ruse, the effort he was putting into his act was impressive. He watched their approach warily – a sizable group of riders, all armed, was a sight to make any stranded traveller nervous – and his hand strayed into the back of the cart for a hammer that, presumably, he had been using in his vain efforts to mend the wheel. He would know it would make no difference in the face of the odds he faced, but Brann guessed that he felt more comfortable with something, anything, but preferably something heavy, in his hand. Brann himself would.
The others drew up in front of him but Brann rode past, circling the area until he was happy that no hidden cut-throats lay waiting for their chance. Not that there was much cover among the small and sparse trees that the road cut through on its way to the plain, but it did no harm to be sure, and took only a moment. He walked his horse up from behind the cart as Cannick climbed stiffly from his saddle and slapped the road dust from his clothes.
‘Look like you could do with some help, feller,’ the grizzled veteran said. ‘Hot enough riding in this heat, never mind trying to sort a wheel on your own.’
The man, around the same age as Cannick but around half his width, relaxed. ‘That I could, friend, that I could.’ He wiped his brow with the back of one hand, but Brann noted that he still held the hammer in his other. These were not totally peaceful lands. ‘It is indeed a touch warm today, but the problem is not so much the heat as the weight of the cart. I have not the strength I once did…’
Breta and Hakon strolled past Cannick. ‘I wouldn’t worry about that, little man,’ Hakon said cheerfully as he continued beyond the carter, slapping him gently on the shoulder and causing the hammer to drop from the man’s hand and narrowly miss his toes. ‘We’ll take care of that.’
The man’s eyes widened and lifted high to follow the pair, regarding them as if a couple of trees had donned clothes and sauntered by. ‘That’s, er, very kind of you,’ he said to Cannick, his eyes still flitting to the large couple. ‘The pin snapped and the wheel just fell off the axle. Nothing else actually broke, so it is just a matter of lifting the cart to let the wheel be slipped back on. I have a spare bit of metal that will serve as a replacement pin in the meantime, if the cart could just be lifted by your two, er, enormous companions.’ He looked quickly at Breta. ‘No offence meant, madam.’
She frowned in confusion. ‘Why would a compliment offend?’ She shook her head as if some people were bewildering and turned to grip the underside of the wagon. Hakon did likewise, and in a heartbeat the pair lifted the heavy wagon level, allowing Brann and Gerens to slide the wheel back into place. Mongoose took a heavy iron nail, around a hand-and-a-half in length, from the man and dropped it through the hole previously meant for the pin, and Hakon lifted the hammer from the ground, bending the pointed end with a single blow to sit neatly flush with the axle and hold the nail in place.
Mongoose looked at the nail appraisingly. ‘Nice work.’
Hakon beamed. He glanced at Brann and Marlo, and winked. Brann avoided catching the Sagian boy’s eye – his own straight face was under enough pressure as it was.
The carter was also beaming, his smile containing considerably fewer teeth than Hakon’s, but no less engaging with simple happiness for it. ‘You are angels of the road, scions of the good gods sent to save a traveller in need. Jacques extends his thanks to the gods and to you for bringing you this way. May fortune bless your every step! May the road bless you with effortless passage! May the sky bless you with fair weather! May your boots bless you with feet free of blisters!’
Mongoose sidled up beside Brann, her voice a murmur. ‘Should have stopped after three blessings. Got a bit desperate by the fourth.’
Brann turned away, his shoulders shaking, as Breta and Hakon eschewed the planks that the carter had used to roll the barrels from the cart and lifted them directly back into it.
Grakk had been quietly watching, having taken the opportunity to seat himself on a rock at the side of the road. ‘Your gratitude is gracious, but unnecessary, my friend. When a man with a predicament such as yours meets a group with capabilities such as ours, there should be only one outcome.’
‘Perhaps in your experience, but not in mine, holy man,’ Jacques said, mistakenly assuming Grakk’s mode of speech and tattooed scalp to be based on religion. He sat on the back of his wagon, clearly glad of the rest before he was on his way. ‘Most armed groups that are met on these roads are wont to take what you have of value and pay you by allowing you to live. If they allow you to live.’
/> Cannick frowned. ‘And Belleville allows this?’
The man spat. ‘Belleville protects Belleville, and its farms on the plain, nothing more. They patrol the plain and hide behind their walls. It is up to us to get ourselves there intact. In truth, the bandits are fairly harmless and not overly numerous. They are no more than lads made desperate by poverty, and if they get enough to keep them going, they are satisfied. The real crooks are in the town. When we do,’ he spat again, ‘they pay a pittance for what we have and charge a fortune for what we want.’
Brann turned, humour forgotten in the face of injustice. ‘Can you not take your goods elsewhere?’
Jacques shrugged. ‘Nowhere else close enough to make it viable, young man.’
Brann still found it hard to understand. ‘Can you not refuse to sell unless they raise their prices? And refuse to buy at the prices they set?’
The man smiled sadly. ‘They grow their necessities for life; what they buy from us is over and above that, such as this oil I carry today. These goods enhance their life and they would not like to be without them for any length of time, but they can afford to survive on basics, just to make a point, and are stubborn enough to do so. We, however, need what they sell to produce what we do, and need their coin to buy what we eat. If I had a farm that produced all I needed to live, I would never soil myself with visiting that accursed town. Too late in my life, though, to change what generations of my family have done. We are carters, pure and simple. We transport, we are paid for transporting, we buy from our neighbours what we can avoid going to town to acquire, and then we transport some more.’
‘So,’ Brann said slowly, a thought growing. ‘If you didn’t have to go to the town today, you would not be distressed.’
The gap-toothed grin returned. ‘If I did not have to go to the town today, I would be bloody overjoyed, young man. Sadly, however, a consignment must be delivered for the fee to be paid, and the consignment will be paid for in the town.’
Brann looked at Grakk, then Cannick. ‘Unless the consignment and the cart are both bought at the side of a road and delivered by its new owners in your stead.’ His eyes had returned to the carter by the end.
The carter shrugged. ‘Should that be a possibility, it would be a welcome possibility.’
‘What are you thinking, Brann?’ Cannick was cautious.
‘I am thinking that a band of armed riders at the gates of a town renowned for its less than welcoming attitude would arouse suspicion. But a band of armed riders escorting a cart through dangerous bandit-ridden countryside would make more sense.’
‘Could we not,’ Konall said, ‘just escort this man to the gates of the town and pose as an escort in that way without having to pay for it in the first place?’
Hope began to fade from the old man’s face.
Brann shook his head. ‘Jacques has been doing this all his life, which is a considerable length of time.’ He looked at the man. ‘No offence meant.’
The man flashed his few teeth at Breta. ‘Why would a compliment offend, eh, young lady?’
She nodded solemnly. ‘Indeed.’ She turned to Hakon. ‘He called me a lady. Did you hear that?’
Brann continued quickly before Hakon could get himself into trouble. ‘The guards at the gate will know Jacques, and would wonder why he has broken the habit of a lifetime to now employ a guard. Whereas,’ he glanced at Konall, ‘a new man starting his business in this area, made nervous by the stories of banditry, might panic and hire a sizable escort. That might seem natural, might it not?’
The tall blond boy nodded. ‘It could make sense.’
Brann looked at Grakk. ‘We have the ability to pay.’
Grakk looked at Sophaya, having entrusted to her the pouches of coin passed to them by their benefactor in ul-Taratac – as the Sagians called their empire – to fund their mission, wherever Loku led them. Who better to know how to keep safe such valuables than the one natural thief in the group?
She nodded. ‘Of course. If that is what you want, it is there.’
Brann took a selection of coins from Sophaya and collected them into a pouch. He turned back to the old carter. ‘Can you buy a new cart in time for your next delivery?’
‘No need, young man. I have two, in case an accident befalls one with more dire consequences than today’s mishap. In any case, your price is far too high. Half of that would more than suffice, even after I purchase two more horses.’
Konall made to speak, but a glare from Cannick and a dig of Mongoose’s sharp elbow jolted him into uncharacteristic restraint.
Brann handed the pouch to Jacques. ‘It is the right amount.’
Cannick had suggested approaching the town’s main gate a little after dusk had started to fall, when the heat of the day had left the guards tired and thinking more of a refreshing drink than the duty involved in the remainder of their shift.
The wait allowed the others to rest in the shadow of the cart while Sophaya rode with the old man to a nearby steading, where he could borrow a mount to see him home. The glee on his face attested to the infrequency in his life when he could wrap his arms around the waist of a young woman. Gerens’s glare removed the glee for as long as it took, Brann noticed with amusement, for the pair to move beyond the grim boy’s line of sight.
Brann sat on the ground and rested his back against the recently repaired wheel. He folded his arms, rested his chin on his chest and closed his eyes, but found himself unable to snooze as the others were doing. His mind whirled and calculated, thoughts fired by his relentless impatience to reel in Loku. His thinking was hampered, though, by his nagging regret at missing the man at Markethaven by only a matter of days, only to be trapped there by the siege for weeks, the frustration driving his mind in circles.
The irritation was still refusing to leave him alone after they had moved off, the sun low in the sky but the air no less stifling for it. He nudged his horse beside those of Grakk and Cannick.
‘How long do you think—?’
Grakk cut in with a smile. ‘It would take Taraloku-Bana, or Loku, as he calls himself in these more norther parts, to reach here? I am only surprised, young Brann, that it has taken you so long to ask when you had time this afternoon to ponder it.’
Brann frowned. ‘I was thinking about it, yes, but every time I tried to think about it, my head kept returning to the way we came so close to him, and yet still he managed to stay ahead of us, while we lost even more time. It was as if the gods were toying with us like a bully dangling a toy in front of a child: almost in reach but then pulling it away at the last instant.’
Cannick spat into the dusty road. ‘The gods do not toy with us. What happens, happens. All we can do in this game that is life is play the dice the way they fall and not waste time wishing they had shown different numbers, or some other player will step in and play our turn.’
Grakk looked at the old soldier with narrowed eyes. ‘An interesting theological philosophy, my friend. Can I ask your religion?’
Cannick barked a cynical laugh. ‘The religion of real life. I have seen many a soldier gutted who, moments before, had prayed to his gods, and others walk from battle without a scratch who had prayed just as piously. The gods may watch us, but the only people who can keep us alive are ourselves and our friends around us, if we are lucky enough to have them. Forget that, and place trust in great beings whose workings we only know of through priests and priestesses – other people just like us, not magical beings of great knowledge, mark you – and all you will do is let your guard down. Plenty of time for pious men to speak to their gods when they meet up with them.’
Grakk nodded thoughtfully. ‘I see. You term it “their gods”. And so, do you believe there are no gods?’
‘Oh, there must be gods.’ A brawny arm swept to indicate the fields around them and beyond, then up to the sky. ‘How else can all this be explained? Someone or something must have made it all, and must keep it all working. There’s enough work there for an army of gods
. Why would they bother whether one of us sticks a sword in another, or falls in love with another, or recovers from a hangover, or wins a wager at the gladiator pit, or whatever else people pray for? But then I’m just an old soldier, and that’s just an old soldier’s opinion.’
‘An old soldier who is still alive, however,’ Grakk pointed out, ‘and whose opinion has therefore been formed and tested in many situations of living or dying.’
Brann thought that Cannick’s views sounded similar to the views of his own upbringing, where practical people lived off the land and prayed in gratitude to gods representing all aspects of nature while, at the same time, learnt to work themselves with all the unpredictable vagaries of nature that each year threw at them. The real problems came from other men, not gods. The thought of home sent a wistfulness through him, prompting in turn thoughts of urgency – and Loku.
He could see that Grakk, the learned gatherer of knowledge, was now intrigued by Cannick’s straightforward philosophies and had another question about to be asked. He cut in quickly. ‘Loku? Distance travelled? Length of time?’
Cannick sighed theatrically. ‘Oh, the impatience of youth. All right, young man, we shall work it out.’ Grakk looked crestfallen, and Cannick patted him consolingly on the shoulder. ‘Worry not, old friend, we can talk more later.’
He closed his eyes, as if to concentrate, and tapped one thumb against the fingers of that hand in turn, as if calculating. ‘Let’s see. From Markethaven, the last place we and he both were, it would be about seven days’ sailing along the south coast and another eight northwards, up the side of the country.’ His eyes flicked open and must have seen Brann’s dismay. ‘But that is in good weather, and in straight lines. He will have been hugging the coast because of the time of year – rough weather in the sea off the south coast and fullblown storms as he turned northward into the big sea. And not only will his winding route and the difficult waters have slowed him down, but he may well have had to put into port a couple of times when the weather got too bad for them.’ He nodded at Konall and Hakon, riding side-by-side in silence ahead of them. ‘The Southern sailors are nothing of the ilk of their lot, who would laugh at a storm and sail through it and out the other side as if the wind were no more than a baby’s fart. But then, the Northerners have such skill bred into them. Those Loku has taken passage with in his journey to meet up with his fellow conspirators,’ he spat again, ‘are not, as I say, that sort of sailor – we already know the first ship he took passage on had needed to put into Markethaven for repairs, causing him to wait until he could leave on the first ship to be headed his way. So I reckon, a good three-and-a-half weeks all in. Then a couple of days overland, east, to this town before us, if he didn’t want to go by boat around the Point of the Last Lands, and I’m fairly sure he will have had quite enough of bumpy seas by then to want to take on the worst part of the sail. Say, four weeks as a good guess.’
Hero Risen (Seeds of Destiny, Book 3) Page 4