by K. J. Parker
“We found something,” Andrapoda said.
Kunessin waited. Then he said, “Well?”
“Come inside,” Aechmaloten said. “See for yourself.”
Kunessin followed them, and soon found himself staring at the handful of brown silt on the shirt. “River sand,” he said. “So what?”
The other indentured men were still and quiet, as though they were holding their breath, and Kunessin sensed danger; not the battlefield sort, but the uneasiness he used to feel when he had to climb into the bull’s pen. Without saying anything, Aechmaloten prodded the sand with his finger. Something sparkled red in the dim firelight.
“We were going to tell you,” Andrapoda said apologetically.
Kunessin wasn’t listening. He didn’t know much about the subject, but he remembered that Aechmaloten and Andrapoda used to be miners, working in the lead pits at the foot of the Blackwater hills. He knelt down (the others pulled away to give him room; the same sort of movement as bullocks shying away when you turn to face them, but immediately they start stalking you again), picked up a pinch of silt between his fingers and squeezed it, looking very closely. The same red sparkle.
“Where exactly did you find it?” he said.
“We can show you the place,” Aechmaloten said. “But chances are the whole river’s full of the stuff. We reckon it washes down from the knees of the mountain.”
For a long time, Kunessin kept perfectly still. “You’ve seen this before,” he said.
Someone else, another ex-miner, nodded. “There were always little bits of colour in the water back home,” he said. “Where there’s lead, there’s quite a good chance there’ll be gold as well. But usually just a few flecks, not enough to get fussed about.” His voice was soft, like someone praying. “Nothing like this.”
Kunessin looked round at their faces: strained, frightened, the expressions of men trying to decide something under enormous pressure. He could guess what was on their minds. After all, they had the advantage of superior numbers, though they’d lost surprise. The question occupying their minds was whether they felt up to taking on five linebreakers. Even with a river full of gold at stake, he was fairly sure they didn’t. But he wasn’t prepared to take any chances.
“We’ll go and have a look first thing in the morning,” he said. “If it’s gold, we’re going to have to talk about this, figure out what we’re going to do.”
He’d said the right thing, or he’d said it in the right way. He could feel the tension lifting, a little. One of the men nodded; a big, broad-shouldered bald man. “We understand,” he said.
“This changes everything, naturally,” Kunessin said. “I’ll have to talk to my partners. After all,” he added, listening to himself as he spoke, “we aren’t miners, we came here to farm. And we still need to get the ship launched, or we’re not going to have any food.”
They hadn’t been thinking about food, or shipbuilding. It was like the moment when two men on the verge of having to fight find a way out of the confrontation, and immediately change the subject. “Will she be ready tomorrow, General, do you think?” the big bald man asked. Kunessin got the feeling he was someone important; he wished he could remember the man’s name.
“That depends on us,” Kunessin replied. “But, obviously, the sooner we get her finished and launched, the sooner we can lay in supplies and get that problem off the slate. Till then, this” - he indicated the molehill of silt with a slight movement of his fingers - “is neither here nor there. I know it’s hard, but best to put it to the back of our minds for now. What do you reckon?”
Of course, they didn’t know him well enough; they hadn’t been there when he’d used that tone of voice, ten, fifteen years ago. Aidi would’ve recognised it at once. “Fair enough,” Aechmaloten said. “First things first, like you say.”
Kunessin nodded. “Settled, then,” he said. “And if I were you, I’d keep this a bit quiet. I mean, I’ll tell my lads, in my own time, but there’s no need to mention it to the women.” He grinned, the universal-conspiracy grin of men talking about the opposite sex. “I reckon we want to keep clear heads for the time being. A load of yap from them’s the last thing we need.”
An appeal to the general, fundamental brotherhood of men; the carefully introduced misconception that common ground in one thing implies a broader sympathy. They’d been taught the principle in their second year at the College, in Logic and Rhetoric, learning to be young gentlemen as well as soldiers. He was glad he’d been paying attention that morning. Several of the men laughed, maybe just a bit louder than the comment warranted, and he felt a little more secure. You don’t laugh at a man’s jokes and then cut his throat in his sleep; not if you’ve missed out on the privilege of a first-rate education. But in his mind, he was thinking about the weapons: where they were, how quickly he could get to them, where he’d have to sit that night so he could keep an eye on both doors.
Chapter Ten
“Send them back,” Aidi insisted; he was hissing like a snake. “As soon as the ship gets here. Otherwise we’re going to get our throats cut in the night.”
It was raining and the roof leaked, which really didn’t help. Kunessin yawned; he hadn’t slept. He looked round for the fifth time, just in case some enemy had crept into the lean-to store in the last ninety seconds. Rainwater dripped from the hole in the roof and puddled in the folds of his sleeve. “Two reasons,” he said. “First, if we send them back, do you really think they’re going to keep their mouths shut once they’re home? I don’t reckon so. I think they’ll come back here with weapons and reinforcements.”
Alces muttered something he didn’t catch, but it sounded positive. Muri was nodding. But Aidi was still glowering at him.
“Second,” he went on, “we may all think we’re still twenty-one years old and a match for anyone and anything, but let’s be realistic. I really don’t fancy making them leave if they don’t want to. It’s not like herding cattle; you can’t just crowd them with hurdles. I’m more interested in avoiding a fight than provoking one.”
Aidi nodded. He had that look on his face that said he believed he was about to win the argument. “Points taken,” he said, “both of them. We can’t let them go, we can’t make them go and we can’t have them here, not if we want to stay alive.” His mouth was thin and his eyes wide. “That only really leaves one course of action, doesn’t it?”
Kunessin took a deep breath. He’d seen it coming. “I’d be reluctant to do that,” he said, wiping rainwater out of his eyes. “Quite apart from the morality of slaughtering a bunch of unarmed men, I’d ask you to consider the likely consequences. We may be on an island, but we’re not outside the jurisdiction. Sooner or later someone’s going to miss them, and then we could be in more trouble than you can possibly begin to imagine.”
Kudei, whose face hadn’t moved, was now frowning. Alces said, “That’s not a genuine option, surely.” Aidi was already thinking about some other line of argument. Kunessin decided it was time to commit his reserve.
“There’s another thing we could do,” he said. “When the ship comes, we get on it.”
That took a moment to sink in. Aidi got there first, of course. “Hold on,” he said. “Are you suggesting we just sail away and leave a riverful of gold to a bunch of servants?”
Kunessin dipped his head, a polite gesture of acknowledgement. “It’s an option,” he said. “Not ideal, I’ll give you that. After all, I’m the one who wanted to come here. It’s my money.” He paused there for a moment, not voluntarily. “But if it’s that or a battle or mass murder, maybe we shouldn’t dismiss it out of hand. If you think about it, I don’t actually see we’ve got a choice.” This time, the hesitation was deliberate. “We aren’t miners,” he said. “And since when have any of us - biggest collection of underachievers the world has ever seen - cared all that much about getting rich?”
He couldn’t help holding his breath as he waited, but when someone eventually spoke, it was only Muri,
who said, “I’m with Teuche,” in a bewildered tone of voice that suggested he wasn’t entirely clear about what he’d just agreed with.
“Have you told the girls yet?” Alces said.
Kunessin shook his head. “Let’s get things sorted out in our own minds before we involve any more outsiders,” he said. Then: “Come on, Aidi, spit it out. What do you reckon?”
But it was Kudei who answered him. “Suppose we do go home,” he said. “What then? Personally, I’m damned if I’m going back to the farm. I can just see the look on my brothers’ faces.”
Kunessin ignored him. “Aidi?” he said.
“I don’t know,” Aidi replied. “I really don’t want to turn my back on a fortune, but I can’t say I like the thought of the servants breathing down my neck. I mean, think about it,” he went on. “We’ve just seriously discussed the pros and cons of slaughtering them like sheep. If the same idea hasn’t crossed their minds already . . .”
“They wouldn’t dare,” Alces said firmly.
“Under normal circumstances, yes,” Aidi snapped back. “And suppose they try it and we win. It’s the point Teuche raised. We’d end up trying to explain ourselves to the advocate general, since this is presumably still military jurisdiction.” He glanced at Kunessin, who looked away. “Sorry, but I can’t see an easy answer. Fly, what do you think?”
Alces frowned, and the thin, melted skin of his face stretched disturbingly. “It’s one of those exam questions from college,” he said, “where there’s always the rider: would your answer be different if. Now, if we still had a barn full of flour, I’d say definitely, we stay. Fact is, though, we’re screwed. We finish building the boat; fine. Who’s going to sail it to the mainland now? If we send indentured men, what’s to stop them recruiting a small army to get rid of us? If we go, I have an idea we might find it difficult getting ashore again. If, say, two of us go, that just leaves three here, which might well tempt them to have a go. If we don’t send the boat, we just sit here waiting for the ship and getting thin; my guess is there’ll be murder done over food, let alone gold. As to what’s likely to happen when the ship gets here, I really don’t want to think about that right now.” He sighed, as if the whole business was bitterly unfair. “The safest option would probably be to slaughter the indentured men and make up some story about pirates, but we’d have to get the girls to go along with it; I don’t think they’re terribly good liars, any of them, and besides, I just don’t feel like committing mass murder. Call me pernickety, but I can’t help it.”
Aidi lifted his head and looked straight at Kunessin. “There you have it then, General,” he said. “You’re the ranking bloody officer. Up to you.”
Kunessin nodded slowly, though he felt anything but calm. “I think we should stay,” he said.
It wasn’t the answer they’d been expecting, but he could tell it was what they’d wanted to hear, though quite probably they hadn’t realised that for themselves. “Mostly,” he went on, “for the reasons Fly’s just given us. Facts, gentlemen. There may or may not be gold in the river. But we can be certain bloody sure there’s not enough food to keep us going till the ship gets here. Therefore, we need to finish the boat; either to get food from the mainland, or to take us there. We can’t finish the boat and get it down to the water on our own, so we need the indentured men. If they’re going to kill us, or try to, they’ll do it very soon; otherwise they’ll talk themselves out of it. So, the simple fact is, we’re going to have to confront the problem whether we give up or not. If we’re going to have to sort things out with the men, we might as well stay here. Like Kudei just said, what the hell is there for any of us back in Faralia?” He paused, a show of inviting reactions: none. “Personally,” he went on, “I just want to farm, I’m not interested in gold-mining. But I spent every quarter I ever had getting us here, so it’s here or nowhere. Therefore, I am not going back; therefore, I’m staying. If you boys want to dig for gold, you carry on. We’ll still all be together, and that’s the important thing.”
He waited again, listening to the steady patter of rain on the roof, and a heartbeat later he knew he’d won. Then Aidi said, “It’s all very well saying, sort things out with the indentured men. How, exactly?”
Kunessin shrugged. “Be straight with them,” he replied. “Straight down the line, like we’ve always been with each other. Fair shares for all. Simple as that.”
As he’d anticipated, Aidi jumped for the fly. “Now hold on,” he said. “I’m all for equality and social justice, but I’m buggered if I’m going to stand for that. They’re just servants, Teuche.”
Kunessin smiled. Aidi had always beaten him in strategy and tactics at the College. “I said fair shares,” he replied. “Not equal shares, necessarily. That wouldn’t be fair, after all.”
Alces laughed, Kudei smiled, Muri looked confused. Aidi was way ahead of them, but still waiting for the detail. “What I propose,” Kunessin went on, “and what I’d like to put to the men, is that we organise it properly, like a trading company. That’s your line, Aidi, you know what I mean. Equal shares for everybody, but only after deductions, the net profits. It’s only right and proper we should get - what’s the phrase, Aidi?”
“Interest on capital,” Aidi said, nodding briskly. “We charge the company a percentage for rent, since it’s our island, and another slice for using our facilities and tools. Or we could do it with shares, weighted to reflect capital contributions.”
It had stopped raining. Kunessin grinned. “That’s the stuff,” he said. “It all sounds so reasonable when you say it like that. The main thing is to calm them down as quickly as possible. Put yourself in their shoes. Why risk taking on five linebreakers and committing murder just to save an extra five shares? They’ll hear what they want to hear, just so long as it sounds reasonable.”
Aidi frowned. “It is reasonable,” he said. “Standard business practice. It’s not like we’re planning to rip them off.”
“Quite,” Kunessin said. “There you are, then, problem solved. Now, first things first, we need to talk to them, before we go and look at the river.” He thought for a moment, then added, “We’d better get dressed first.”
Alces looked at him. “Why? I thought the whole idea was—”
“It’ll do no harm,” Kunessin said firmly.
Getting dressed meant crossing the yard to the middle barn. “Just as well I brought all this stuff,” Kunessin said, as they levered the lid off a barrel.
“Never leave home without it,” Kudei murmured.
The mail shirts had been carefully oiled and packed in sand, but there was still a brown dew of rust on them, and that unmistakable smell. “Coifs but no helmets,” Kunessin said. “We want to make a point, not scare them to death.” From the weapon chests they chose catsplitters, the trademark short, wide swords of the linebreakers, with their distinctive double-ring hilts. “Where’d you get these, Teuche?” Muri asked.
“Government issue,” Kunessin replied. “I had them booked out to a disbanded unit. When they came back, they were off the book, so the quartermaster just wanted rid of them. Shocking waste of taxpayers’ money.”
Everyone laughed, except Aidi. “Nice touch,” Alces said. “Instantly recognisable, reminds them who they’re messing with.” He grinned. “Let’s just hope we don’t have to use them.”
A Company despised the catsplitter. They’d traded the ones they were issued with to souvenir-hunters in return for Type Fifteens or civilian falchions. Aidi had moaned about that, too.
“Which raises the issue . . .” Kudei’s head emerged through the neck hole of his mail shirt; his hair was messed up, and he had a smudge of brown oil on his forehead. “Rules of engagement.”
Kunessin adjusted his belt. “Use your common sense,” he replied. “We can’t afford to take any nonsense, but the idea is, we’ve got to live with these people. If we start something, I’m afraid we’ll have to finish it, and that’s all our plans screwed up.”
The
yard smelt of fresh rain. It reminded Teuche of late spring back on the farm, and for a moment he couldn’t think what the hell he was doing dressed up in armour like a soldier. He watched Alces skip lightly over a puddle, graceful as a dancer, only to have Muri splash him with muddy water as he stumbled in a pothole.
“Gentlemen,” he said, and pushed open the door.
The indentured men were still in their huddle, at their end of the building. Kunessin could see Dorun and the other women staring at them, suddenly frozen by the sight of armour and weapons. The men turned to look at them; one started to jump up, but was quickly pulled down.
“General.” Kunessin was relieved to hear Aechmaloten’s voice. He looked for him and saw him sitting slightly to one side, with a tin dish on his lap. “You look like you’re expecting trouble.”
Bravely said; but spoiled by a very slight stammer on the “p” of “expecting”. “Not me,” Kunessin said, loud enough to be heard by everyone but still within his normal conversational range. “Join me outside; we want to talk to you.”
He could read the looks on their faces easily enough, and silently congratulated himself. Aechmaloten didn’t want to be a leader, let alone a ringleader, which was why he’d chosen him for precisely those roles. None of the others wanted to go outside with five armed and notoriously dangerous men, so Aechmaloten had just got himself elected spokesman. He tried very hard not to feel sorry for the man as he crossed the floor.
As soon as they were back in the yard: “Well?” he said. “Is it gold?”
Aechmaloten hesitated, avoiding the five stares. “We reckon so,” he said. “There’s proper tests, with chemicals. But we fancy we can tell gold when we see it.”
Kunessin nodded. “No way of telling how big a strike, obviously.”
Aechmaloten shrugged. “It was a lot of colour in a small place,” he replied, “and all we did was scoop it up, not having a pan with us. We’re pretty sure.”