I saw the riders, and understood. They were a halfdozen, streaming in single file up the waterfront towards us, heads down, weapons drawn. They veered into the trees at the point where Casta Canto gave way to the forest, hardly slowing. A moment later, the last had been consumed by the deep arboreal shadows.
They'd been travelling at speed, a good distance away. I wouldn't have recognised them but for one detail. For the briefest instant, their leader had glanced in our direction – and there was no mistaking that florid, eye-patched face.
Castilio Mounteban had saved our lives again.
CHAPTER 13
Though the day was still cold, the water was glassy and calm beyond Casta Canto. Willows dredged their leaves from the banks. Waterfowl steered around the leafy curtains and each other in complex, aimless patterns. Sometimes a boat would pass, usually a scow moving cargo to or from distant Altapasaeda. The sight of two people in a nine-tenths-sunk skiff being clumsily rowed by a giant drew questions, jeers or, most often, stares of speechless alarm.
When we had the river to ourselves, there was nothing to hear except the sough of wind in the trees and our oars slapping rhythmically through the surface. No one had much to say after the incident with the ferry, and it made for a strange sort of silence, tense and uncomfortable.
Saltlick appeared to be rapt in his newfound occupation, though perhaps his look of absorption had as much to do with trying not to upset our beleaguered craft. He couldn't have stared more intently into the distance if he'd been powering the boat by sheer force of will. Estrada had been gazing at the forest since Mounteban and his companions had vanished, as though she expected them suddenly to burst forth again. Mounteban had confused the issue of his betrayal by rescuing us, and probably she found the whole matter very puzzling and significant.
It had occupied my own thoughts for all of about two minutes. It was clear that he'd waited near Casto Canto, assuming we'd be too lost and disorganised to deviate from the plan. It was equally obvious that his motive for such a preposterous and melodramatic deed was his obsession with Estrada. The only question in my mind was whether he'd try to follow us further. If he did, he'd have little luck now that the width of the Casto Mara was between us.
With that cleared up, I'd decided I still couldn't give a donkey's arse about the fat old crook. It wasn't me or Saltlick he'd saved. He probably wouldn't piss on me if I was on fire and he had a bladder infection. We would likely have escaped anyway, and without so much carnage or needless spectacle. All told, it was easy for me to put aside the whole shameful incident.
At first, I'd experimented with trying to get comfortable, but I was too cramped to make any headway. Even stretching a foot or twitching a hand sent the boat into dangerous convulsions. I settled for watching the clouds scud by overhead. After a while, I drifted off, half awake. I'd start occasionally, struggle to remember where I was, and look around in alarm at the liquid expanse around me. The sun was lower in the sky each time, there was a little more chill in the air, and Saltlick and Estrada were still gazing at nothing. On the fourth such occasion, I found the sky streaked with melting bands of purple, and the nip in the breeze a distinct coldness. Little else had changed, within or without the boat. Estrada had her eyes closed, Saltlick was still rowing steadfastly, and ducks and moorhens were still bustling about. The river's flow had picked up, however, since my last inspection. The ripples were white-flecked once again, and deep enough that in the failing light the muddy current resembled a furrowed field convulsing under small tremors. We must have travelled quite a distance into Paen Acha. The forest would continue more or less unbroken on the east bank until the tail of the valley choked it off. To the west, it was only a wide stripe across the land, which soon would give way to…
"Saltlick," I cried, failing to keep the alarm out of my voice, "we should stop now."
Estrada's eyes flicked open. "We've an hour's light left," she said, sounding slightly groggy.
"That's nothing to do with it. Saltlick, pull in to the bank."
Estrada, wide-awake now, told him, "Keep going. Leave him alone, Damasco."
"We're getting close to Altapasaeda."
"So?"
"So, there may not be many places where I'm welcome in the Castoval, but there's only one where they'll chop my head off before they even bother to arrest me. The farther I stay from Altapasaeda and their crazy ideas about law enforcement, the less likely they are to find an opportunity."
Estrada looked at me with puzzlement. Then, as though talking to an addled child, she said, "Damasco, where did you think we'd been going to all this time?"
In retrospect, standing up in the boat wasn't the best idea I'd ever had. Alarm at Estrada's revelation seemed like less and less of a good excuse as the night wore on. While it had achieved what I'd wanted, that hadn't proved to be much comfort – not as I tumbled into the river, not while I flailed to keep my head above the surface, not even as I floundered to the bank and lay choking greenish water into the mud.
Nor had it carried much weight with Estrada and Saltlick. Estrada proved a strong swimmer after her initial panic, and Saltlick was able to gain a footing on the riverbed; the sight of his upturned face bobbing shoreward would have been humorous under better circumstances. He'd even managed to salvage our boat, dragging it behind him with one hand.
Once they'd landed, it had provided them a seat from which to ignore me.
Since no real harm had been done, such vindictiveness struck me as uncalled-for. Estrada only broke the wall of silence when – sick of shivering on a fallen tree trunk in my sodden cloak – I decided to build a fire.
"Are you insane?"
I glared at her. "What was that? I couldn't hear for the sound of my teeth chattering. If it was 'Are you cold, drenched and pissed off?' then the answer is yes."
"You know we can't light a fire."
"I know that the troops at Casta Canto were a scout party, and we must be far ahead of them by now. I know we've likely gained the same lead on all of Moaradrid's forces. So I suggest that, when the alternative is freezing to death, we should make the most of it."
"You talk as though none of this is your fault."
"And you talk as if this didn't happen because you've been leading me into the hands of people who want to kill me."
Estrada sighed, ran a hand through mud-clotted hair. "Fine, do what you like. It was stupid of me to think you'd listen to anyone but yourself."
"Whenever I do," I called at her retreating back, "it seems to end badly."
I turned irritably back to my would-be fire. It had been hard to find dry wood, or indeed dry anything, and it was a long time before my carefully constructed heap of grass and sticks produced much besides smoke. I nearly whooped with joy when the first amber tongue licked out from a fissure between two twigs. Conscious of Estrada's eyes on me, I tried to pretend it was exactly what I'd been expecting. After that, it was easy work to pile logs and branches onto the hungry blaze, until it danced waist-high in the twilight.
I'd been wondering if Estrada's stubbornness would win out over her misery. I was pleased when she and Saltlick came to join me, Saltlick still hauling the upturned boat behind him, trailing its broken mast like a tail.
"Are you sure you want to sit here?" I asked, chewing a piece of soggy bread I'd discovered in one of my pockets. "I'm expecting Moaradrid's entire army to arrive at any minute."
"Yes, Damasco. I'd like to share your fire, if that's all right."
"Of course it is, Mayor Estrada."
"And perhaps," Estrada added, with a glance towards Saltlick, "we can save any other matters for a later date."
What she meant was, "Let's not argue in front of the giant."
Her tone conjured a memory, of my father speaking to my mother when she returned from one of her nights of drunken frivolity. A little, timid man, he would listen to her rant about some inconsequential thing, and then say softly, "Perhaps we can discuss this later, my darling?"
Close on its heels came another vision: Estrada and myself, wearing the joyous expression of proud parents, stood over a gigantic crib in which sat a dribbling, hiccupping Saltlick.
I shuddered.
Still, I'd no desire for any more forced reconciliations; my throat was still smarting from the last one. I managed a smile, and said, "Of course."
Anyway, I had more immediate concerns. The wet bread had only enraged my appetite, and all the rest of my edible supplies had ended up in the river. It didn't make me feel any better to watch Saltlick contentedly tucking into bunches of leaves he'd stripped from a nearby bush.
"Do you have anything we can eat?" I asked Estrada.
"I left my rucksack on the harbour in Casta Canto," she replied, a little guiltily.
"Then I'm going to see what I can find."
Two miserable hours had passed before I returned. The fruit of my labours was a handful of gnarled apples and a rabbit so ancient it would probably have expired that night even if I hadn't clubbed it over the head with a rock. My fire had tormented me all the while as a glimmer of beckoning orange through the trees, and I was depressed to find that Estrada had let it burn down to a heap of flickering embers. I added branches to the neglected blaze, then sat down next to her and set about gutting the geriatric rabbit. Estrada eyed the work with distaste, but said nothing.
I was drooling with hunger by the time I'd rigged a makeshift spit and begun to roast my prize. Yet once it was done and the meat divided, our portions were so meagre that you'd have thought I'd cooked a shrew. With vigorous chewing, it was edible at least, and followed by the apples it dealt with the worst of my stomach cramps. Since Saltlick lay beside the boat heaving out loud snores, I decided the time was right to tell Estrada what I thought of her plot to get me executed.
Perhaps she caught the glint in my eye. "I know what you think about going to Altapasaeda. You made that quite clear when you capsized our boat."
"That was an accident. Not that I wouldn't have done it deliberately if it meant keeping my head on my shoulders."
"I also know how stringently they pursue the law there. Nevertheless, it's crucial that we go to Altapasaeda, and terrible things will happen if we don't. So before we begin arguing again, won't you listen to why? I'll tell you the truth – the whole of it."
Her tone was almost beseeching. This wasn't what I'd expected. "I'll listen, but nothing you say is going to make me value my head any less."
Estrada nodded, gazed thoughtfully into the fire, and said, "I'm not sure where to begin. Anyone else would have worked out most of it already. You've a knack for ignoring the big questions."
"That's untrue. I'm the first to ask what's for dinner, or where the nearest inn is. Perhaps we just disagree about what the big questions are."
"You haven't wondered how Moaradrid recruited the giants, or why?"
I remembered what I'd overheard him say, that night in his encampment. "The 'why' is obvious. Once he's subdued the Castoval, he plans to march north again, against the King. It takes more than a bunch of unwashed plainsmen to pull off something like that."
Estrada looked impressed. "You have been paying some attention. But you didn't ask why the giants would follow him when they hate fighting so much? It's not as though they can't stand up for themselves."
"I wondered. Then I got diverted by fleeing for my life."
Her voice dropped to a whisper. "And the stone? You didn't ask yourself what the stone is for?"
Did she mean the jewel I'd left in Reb Panza? No, she could only be talking about that red-striped pebble, which I'd found in Moaradrid's pouch and thought no more about. They'd taken it from me when I was imprisoned in the caves, and I'd hardly noticed the loss. Now that I thought back, though, hadn't Moaradrid referred to a stone as well?
"All right, you've got me there. What is it?"
"It's the answer, Damasco."
I had to lean in close to catch her next words.
"One of our agents found this out, once we discovered what Moaradrid had brought back from the south. Giant society is very simple, you see – what you might call an elective monarchy. They decide on a leader, and that giant has responsibility for the tribe. Since all the giants are more or less equal and they don't tend to argue, or go anywhere, or do anything unusual, it's not the most taxing position – although they take it very seriously.
"Anyway. The giants don't seem to hold much with airs and graces, but their leader does get a staff to mark them out in a crowd. The staff is just a piece of wood; it's probably changed a dozen times over the centuries. What matters is the stone mounted at the top. Simply put, whoever holds that is chief, for as long as they live, absolutely and without dispute."
"That's what it is? That pebble is their chief-stone? And Moaradrid stole it." This struck me as remarkably funny, for reasons I couldn't quite put my finger on.
"Then you stole it from him."
"And he's been chasing me all this time to get it back." The final pieces slipped into place, and then I really couldn't help but laugh. "So that's why you've been using us as bait. Moaradrid will chase up and down the Castoval forever, because if he doesn't then sooner or later he'll have a mob of disgruntled giants to contend with." I shook my head, suddenly bewildered. "All this for a bit of rock. I'd have given it back if he'd only asked."
"It's a good job for the Castoval, for the whole land, that you didn't. He'd probably be sitting in the royal palace by now."
"And I'd be asleep in bed, instead of on a log in the middle of nowhere talking to you. That doesn't sound like such a bad deal." Before Estrada could tell me what she thought of my priorities, I added, "None of this explains why I have to go to Altapasaeda and have my head chopped off."
"That's what I've been trying to tell you. As a mayor, I have diplomatic privileges, and Prince Panchetto wouldn't dare ignore that even now. As long as you're in my entourage, you're safe. I have my own reasons for going there, but as far as the plan is concerned it will give Moaradrid a chance to catch up."
"That's a good thing?"
"It is if we're going to lead him into our ambush. Except, none of that can work if you're not there, because as far as he's concerned you have the stone, or at least are the only one who knows where it is. So you see, Easie, I have to protect you if I'm going to save the Castoval."
"Yes, I see."
What I didn't say was, "This all assumes you can protect me. Marina Estrada, mayor of a town that was probably in enemy hands by now, leader of a resistance so petty and muddled that the greater part of the Castoval had no idea it existed. What exactly was the diplomatic status of an ex-mayor, or a failed resistance leader?" Whatever the answer, I doubted her word would carry as much weight in Altapasaeda as she imagined it would.
The question was ultimately irrelevant, because I hadn't the faintest intention of going there. The crucial fact, which Estrada had failed to mention, was that I no longer had the stone. Presumably, she did. If that was the case, there were two possibilities: she'd have to reveal it in order to lure Moaradrid, or her plan would fail, she'd be captured, and it would fall into his possession that way. Whatever happened, I'd only have to stay out of his hands for a week, probably less, and then his interest in me would evaporate. This mad, interminable hunt would be over.
Just to make sure I said, with laboured innocence, "It won't work, though. I lost the stone days ago. I didn't know the thing was important so I didn't think much about it."
Estrada reached up and drew the neck of her undershirt open. For one terrifying moment, I thought she was about to try to seduce me. Then I saw the pouch, worn like a collar over her breastbone.
"We took it from you, while you were asleep in the caves. We genuinely didn't know whose side you were on. Then Castilio suggested sending you to rescue Saltlick, to test you and to put Moaradrid on our trail. It would have been ridiculous to hand it back to you and say 'try not to lose this when you're down there in Moaradrid's camp'. After that there was never an
opportunity."
"That's fine. I don't want the damn thing anyway."
"As long as Moaradrid believes you have it, that's all that matters. We could give it to Saltlick and it wouldn't make any difference."
I laughed. "Saltlick, chief of the giants! What would he do? I don't think he's the order-giving type."
Estrada smiled. "I'm glad we talked. I wish I could have been honest with you earlier. You see now why you have to come to Altapasaeda with me?"
"I do."
Which wasn't to say that I planned to. Getting out of her absurd scheme would be another matter – but one that could wait until morning at least.
"We should try and catch some sleep. We've a long day ahead."
"Yes." Estrada slid to the ground, so that her back was propped against the log and her body lay alongside the fire. "Goodnight, Damasco."
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