The Many Deaths of the Black Company

by Glen Cook

  Swan grumbled, “I don’t understand why they weren’t just sitting here waiting for us.”

  “Probably because there’s not much here to eat, it’s a long way from where things are happening and they couldn’t know when we’d arrive. Or even if we would. They have an empire up north to keep in line. And if they were camped out here, chances are we’d just not bother to come off the plain. Also, I would imagine that they really expected us to follow the forvalaka once we understood what had happened here. So they could trap us north of the Dandha Presh. In familiar territory, closer to home. Which I would’ve run into if I didn’t have the Blacks Hounds and whatnot to go scouting.

  “On top of the distance for them, there’re a raft of superstitions about this country. Plus there’s just been a change in the head of the Voroshk family. Somebody called the Old One died unexpectedly about the time we climbed onto the plain. His replacement seems to be more action-oriented.”

  “And you got all that by talking to crows?”

  “They’re smart birds, Swan. Smarter than a lot of people. They make wonderful scouts.”

  Doj asked, “What is our strategy now?”

  “We sit tight. We wait. We let the Black Hounds play. They like to tease horses.”

  Everybody looked at me with that exasperated expression I recalled from those days when I was the Captain and played my cards close to my chest. I shuddered, forced myself to open up further.

  “They’ve separated a small light cavalry force in order to make more speed. The Unknown Shadows will start tormenting the horses after nightfall. Subtly, of course. We don’t want to lose them. The bigger ones are going to work on the forvalaka by letting her see them as One-Eye’s ghost. I’m hoping she’ll rush on down here ahead of her friends. So we can kill her and get out before they get here.” There. I had shared.

  I felt lousy. I felt like something was sure to go wrong now that I had talked about it.

  Silence. Which stretched. Until Murgen finally asked, “Will it work?”

  “How the fuck should I know? Ask me again this time tomorrow.”

  Lady asked, “What’re we going to do about Goblin?”

  “Keep an eye on him. Don’t let him get near One-Eye’s spear.” That all seemed self-evident to me.

  Silence stretched again. Then Swan said, “Here’s a thought. Why don’t we leave Goblin here when we pull out?”

  I grumped, “I thought he was your friend.”

  “Goblin was. But we’ve already decided that this can’t be the Goblin we knew. Right?”

  “But there’s a chance the Goblin we knew might still be inside him waiting to be let back out. Like the rest of us when we were buried under the plain.”

  “And us guys who weren’t aren’t so sure about you.”

  “Just say I’ve developed a soft streak. We’ll treat the guy like Goblin till he does something that makes us want to hang him. Then we’ll string him up.” I had to posture some. It was expected of me.

  Murgen observed, “The Captain is still solving her personnel problems by exiling the questionables to Khatovar.”

  “And that’s funny?” Because he was smiling.

  “Of course it is. In the sense that neither you nor I nor Lady would’ve considered doing anything like that while we were in charge.”

  “Everybody’s a sarcastic social critic,” I told Lady. “Don’t you let on that you can’t kick Goblin’s ass all the way to Hsien when he gets here. I’ll try to keep him so busy he doesn’t have time to get into trouble. But it’ll help if he believes he has to walk a narrow line, too.”

  “He won’t have to be convinced of that. He isn’t stupid.”

  “How much longer you going to need us?” Swan asked. He had begun shuffling a deck of cards. Murgen and Thai Dei seemed eager to join him in a pastime that had made a comeback during our sojourn in the Land of Unknown Shadows.

  “Go ahead. There’s not much to do now but wait. And watch Uncle Doj sneak around with all those snail shells like he can’t even conceive of the idea that anybody would be alert enough to notice.” That was how the Unknown Shadows had crossed the plain and gotten here. So who on my team was in cahoots with Tobo and the Captain?

  I could not wait forever, though. Nor did I have any intention of facing any Voroshk soldiers. My only quarrel with the Voroshk sprang from their presumption that the Company existed only as an as yet untapped resource.

  I deplore that attitude wherever I encounter it.

  * * *

  There was a full moon in Khatovar that night. I went strolling in the moonlight. My ravens came and went. They traveled like lightning as long as I did not try to watch them do it.

  The Unknown Shadows are every bit as wicked and dangerous as Hsien folklore indicates. It was almost too easy for them to taunt and lure the forvalaka away from the umbrella of protection offered by the Voroshk sorcerers.

  27

  Shadowlands: Breakout

  The Captain slithered up beside Suvrin, lifted her head just enough to be able to see the Shadowgate separating the plain from home. “We’re only thirty miles from where you were born, Suvrin.” She had tried for years now to think of a better nickname than Suvrin, which meant Junior in Sangel, his native tongue. She had not found anything more exotic that fit.

  “Less. I wonder if anybody’ll remember me.”

  Behind them thousands waited anxiously. Hungrily. Way too much time had gotten wasted crossing the plain. Sleepy brushed aside a twinge of guilt.

  “How many of them are there?” she asked. A camp lay just below the Shadowgate. Built on the remains of old Company camps, it looked to have been there a long time. Its shelters had a makeshift but permanent appearance. They were part of a squalor which characterized all things military under the Protector’s rule.

  “There are fifty-six people. Including nine women and twenty-four children.”

  “That isn’t exactly enough to stop a breakout attempt.”

  “We aren’t why they’re there. They’re armed but they aren’t real soldiers. They don’t pay any attention to the road or the gate. During the day most of them just work their fields.” Several feeble examples of primitive agriculture lay scattered along the banks of the creek at the bottom of the hill. “I thought about jumping them but decided I’d better wait till Tobo could look them over. I think they’re really here because of the shadows.”

  “We’ll send commandos down after sunset. Roll them up before they know what hit them.” The Captain was not pleased with her protégé’s indecision.

  Suvrin said, “Better have Tobo check them out first. Really. They’re always more active after dark.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “It’s almost twilight now. Hang on. You’ll see what I mean.”

  “Don’t make me wait all night, Suvrin.” Sleepy eased back. Once she could rise without being seen from below she did so, strode to her waiting staff. “There’s a garrison in our way. Not a large one. Shouldn’t be any trouble because they don’t appear to be expecting anything. I want to make sure none of them get away once we move. Runmust. Iqbal. Head back up the road. Have everybody fall out. Maintaining plain discipline. Tell them to eat. To get their weapons ready. No fires permitted, though. We don’t want to show any smoke or light. We might not go in till after midnight but I want everyone ready to go when I say it’s time to go.”

  Relays of messengers carried word back along the column.

  * * *

  “There. Watch. That’s what I mean,” Suvrin said, pointing. Tobo and the Captain lay to either side of him. The garrison below had begun an exhaustive examination of the area around the Shadowgate, illuminating the area from several directions using a variety of sources of light. “They’re obviously looking for leaks right now. It’ll get more interesting in a minute.”

  Soon afterward a three-man team brought up a thin-necked earthenware jar of about a gallon’s capacity mounted in a wooden rack which they crowded right up against the sorc
erous boundary that prevented the shadows, the Unforgiven Dead, from leaving the plain.

  The lighting was bright but still not good enough for even Tobo’s sharp young eyes to discern clearly what was going on but, whatever they were up to, those people were being extremely cautious.

  “I’ve got it!” Tobo said after watching intently for about ten minutes. “They’re trying to catch shadows. They’ve got a tiny little hole bored through the barrier there and they’re hoping an overeager shadow will pop through it into their jar.”

  “They work for Soulcatcher,” Sleepy said, maybe just to dampen the boy’s enthusiasm. She now understood why Suvrin had been so cautious.

  “Of course they do. Who else? We need to think this over. If she has a whole bunch of shadows under her control.…”

  “It’s too late to turn back.” As though he had suggested anything of the sort. Sleepy rolled onto her back, rubbed her forehead with her left hand. The stars above were the stars of her childhood. She had not seen them for far too long. “I missed our stars.”

  Suvrin replied, “I did, too. I’ve spent a lot of time here just enjoying them.”

  “You haven’t sent even one scout through yet?”

  “I really haven’t had the chance. I didn’t want to commit you to anything by taking everything into my own hands. Anyway, I had to fix the gate before I could do anything else and I’ve gotten maybe an hour a night when I could get down there to work on that.”

  “It’s ready, now, though. Isn’t it? I’ve got twelve thousand men up here. Don’t tell me we have to wait some more.”

  “You can go through any time.”

  Tobo grunted. “The Nef.”

  Sleepy rolled back onto her stomach. Sure enough, the dreamwalkers had appeared down by the locals. They remained transparent. They jumped and gestured. The workers beyond the barrier ignored them.

  “They can’t see them,” Tobo said.

  The Nef abandoned their effort to communicate with the shadowcatchers and swept upslope to harangue the watchers on the lip of the plain.

  “What’re they trying to tell us?” Sleepy asked.

  Tobo replied, “I don’t know. I can actually hear a whisper sometimes but I still can’t understand them. If Dad was here.… He was almost a dreamwalker. I think he might understand them a little bit.”

  “It’s probably safe to assume that there’s something they don’t want us to do. That’s what it always has been once somebody does figure it out. But doing what we want hasn’t ever led to trouble for us. Has it?”

  The wait stretched. Suvrin said, “It’s always like this.” He rolled over. “Why don’t we watch for shooting stars?”

  Tobo said, “I’m going down there. I want to hear what they’re saying.”

  “Ignoring the fact that they’ll see you, when did you learn to speak Sangel?” Sleepy asked.

  “I’ve picked up a few words from Suvrin. We had to do something during those tedious journeys to the Shadowgates. Although I don’t think these guys will be speaking anything but Taglian. They have to be people the Protector trusts. Meaning people whose families are where she can eat them up if she’s disappointed with anybody’s behavior. They aren’t going to see me.”

  Doj had taught him well. He was all but invisible descending that slope, using no magic at all. The shadowcatchers noticed nothing. But the dreamwalkers did. They became agitated. Then the few shadows in the vicinity, not swarming beside the road with all their kin, hoping some soldier would stupidly break the protective barrier, also began to scoot from hiding place to hiding place erratically. One darted up and through the pinhole into the earthenware jar.

  The shadowcatchers congratulated one another. In a moment they had both jar and barrier sealed, the latter with an almost invisible bit of bamboo. Tobo sensed powerful spells in its wood. Soulcatcher did not want the more potent shadows pushing through that valve.

  The capture of a single shadow satisfied the shadowcatchers. They packed up for the night.

  “That’s it?” Sleepy asked.

  “That’s the first time I’ve actually seen them catch one,” Suvrin replied. “I guess it doesn’t happen very often.”

  Moments after the shadowcatchers left, Tobo stepped through the Shadowgate into the world of his birth. Suvrin had made his repairs correctly.

  The boy took a deep breath. He listened to the soft noises made by the commandos already coming down from the plain. There had been no alarm as he had passed through the Shadowgate and there was none when the commandos began to ease through. Plainly, the Protector did not fear the south. Though she had leapt up from the grave a few times herself, she did not anticipate that kind of refractory behavior on the part of her enemies.

  “Water sleeps,” Tobo told the night, and began to cast a spell that would send the shadowcatcher crew into a deep sleep. He had learned the spell from One-Eye, who had stolen it from Goblin over a hundred years ago.

  Always his thoughts found their way back to Goblin.

  Kina was the Mother of Deceivers. Suppose she had done nothing whatsoever to the little wizard? Nobody would believe that. And nobody would ever trust him again. Tons of time and resources would be wasted keeping an eye on him.

  Was that it? Was Goblin just a diversion? Was there any way to find out?

  He was supposed to be on fire with the creative brilliance of youth. He ought to be able to devise something workable.

  * * *

  The prisoners looked on in wide-eyed amazement as battalion after battalion marched down off the plain. An army this size had not been seen since the Kiaulune wars. Soulcatcher had won the laurels in that round because the Company had been hopelessly outclassed in matters of sorcery.

  The Radisha Drah and the Prahbrindrah Drah had prominent places in that parade. Clad in imperial finery, accompanied by dozens of Taglian royal banners, their presence was a declaration Sleepy wanted made early and often.

  It was a declaration that was wasted here, of course, because none of these witnesses would be allowed to carry the news out ahead of the advance of the invasion force. But Sleepy thought it would be a good idea for the Prince and Princess to begin practicing to reassume their historic roles.

  Suvrin was gone already. As were scores more pickets and scouts and recon soldiers. The Soldiers of Darkness were loose. Poor Suvrin was having to run ahead again, now tasked to close the southern end of the pass through the Dandha Presh. A job for which he needed no special training. It was the one he had held at the time when Sleepy had taken him prisoner, while on her way to release us poor old Captured from our durance beneath the plain.

  Once Suvrin was sure the pass could not be used by rumor-mongers from the south side he was supposed to go on through and seize the military works at Charandaprash. Which were likely to have no garrison at all, considering Soulcatcher’s attitude toward her armed forces.

  Suvrin would know that layout well before he got there. Tobo had brought sack after sack of old snail shells off the plain once the way was open. An unseen flood had begun to spread across the region once known as the Shadowlands. Tobo would know everything his creatures knew. Tobo would have those creatures carry the news to anyone else who needed to know it.

  Tension ran high and continued to rise. Those who knew Soulcatcher knew she would hear of the invasion eventually. Her response was sure to be violent and showy, swift and unpredictable and nothing anyone wanted to endure.

  28

  The Taglian Territories: The Blind Measures of Despair

  Narayan groaned when the girl wakened him. He regained control quickly, however. The Protector was out there somewhere, never closer than she had been these past two days. The Daughter of Night’s valiant efforts, using talents she did not understand, had been just enough to prevent their capture. But it was a close thing every day. And the game might not last much longer. He and the girl had nothing left. If the Protector brought in some of the shadows she controlled …

  “What is it?”
he breathed. He fought the pain that was with him always nowadays.

  “Something’s happened. Something big. I can feel it. It’s … I don’t know. It’s like my mother woke up, took a look around, then went back to sleep.”

  Narayan did not understand. He said so.

  “It was her. I know. She touched me.” From confusion the girl moved swiftly toward assurance and confidence. “She wanted me to know that she’s still there. She wanted me to hang on. She wanted me to know things will be getting better soon.”

  Narayan, who had known the girl’s birth mother well, suspected the child took after her aunt, the Protector, far more. The Protector was changeable. The Daughter of Night’s moods could shift with a change in the breeze. He wished she were more stable, like her mother. Although Lady could become obsessively focused. For example, she was determined to even scores with him and the Deceiver cult. She had been Kina’s tool but had no love or respect whatsoever for the Goddess.

  “Did you hear me, Narayan? She’s there! She’s not going to lay low much longer.”

  “I heard. And I really am as excited as you are. But there are wonders and wonders. We still have to get away from the Protector.” He indicated the sky to their west. Crows swarmed not half a mile down the long, scrubby slope.

  Soulcatcher had her obsessions, too. This chase had gone on forever, successfully for neither party thereto. Did the Protector have no other work to do? Who was managing Taglios and its territories? Deviltry was sure to flourish in her absence.

  From the beginning of the chase Narayan had been confident that Soulcatcher would get bored and would turn to something else. She always did.

  But not this time. This time she was dogged.

  Why?

  No telling with the Protector. She might have had a vision of the future. She might be unable to think of a more amusing hobby. She was twisted inside. Her motives might not always make sense even to her.

  The crows began to fan out to the north of what must be Soulcatcher’s position. They seemed to be interested in a slice of pie arc. They drifted on the breeze, not working hard, slowly moving away. Narayan and the Daughter of Night watched without moving. Crows were sharp of eye. If the two most holy Deceivers could see them, the crows could see the Deceivers in turn—if the girl’s erratic talent failed for even a moment.