by Pam Uphoff
"Lt. Demornia?"
"That one." The black haired girl looked resigned.
"Lt. Handowski?"
"Tol." Another harem girl, one with a wizard baby.
"Right, the rest of you women will be living in there. See the current residents about exactly where. Troops dismissed."
The current residents of the bordello were all looking on, and two of them seemed to be getting congratulations.
"So, what's your name?" The brown hair girl crossed her arms, uncrossed them and tried to look friendly.
"Captain Jin Genero, you can call me Jin, or Captain Jin, as you wish."
She took a deep breath and forced a smile. "I'm Cina Saro."
"All right. My century is broken into three platoons. Left Flank, Right Flank and Center, keeping the names easy for all of them to remember. Those are their three barracks. Stay out of them and you'll probably be fine. That is the Cat House. That is the kitchen and mess hall, and this is headquarters. Corporal Lebonift and I, and now you, are the only ones living here."
The Corporal was, in fact, looking hopeful.
"No."
The Corporal's face fell.
Jin hesitated, "Just a hint, but that old woman? She knows some real tricks, try her." He winked and continued in, while the corporal waffled, and then headed for the Cat House.
"Was that nice?" her voice squeaked an bit, nervously.
"No, but I don't think 'nice' is a word usually applied to that woman. This is the corporal's office, this is mine, that is our meeting room. The Corporal's quarters, and mine, and now yours."
"Umm, there's no furniture," she eyed the narrow bunk he'd taken from the ship. "Or, not much."
"Exactly. I'll try to do better than a sharp knife for tools, and assign some people to chop down some trees . . . What?" He stopped at her wince.
"Fresh, green wood warps. It makes very bad furniture."
"Hmm, well, I don't see any options right now."
"All right," she shifted nervously, "Could you have your men cut trees soon so I can try to season some, at least for table tops?"
"Tomorrow soon enough?"
She nodded, "And may I pick the trees?"
"Certainly."
He scratched his cheek thoughtfully, "I'm afraid I have some paperwork to take care of. Make your self at home, and . . . I guess I'll have to see about getting you some 'things' to have."
The old women had had bags, the two young girls had the clothes they stood up in.
He rummaged through his own sparse possessions. Dug out a couple of old shirts, his sewing kit, well, a needle and a small bit of thread. "Hmm, not much to work with."
"Thank you. I'll, umm, I'll try to, umm."
He shook his head. "You'll do all right. Oh. The back door. There's an out-house to the left. To the right a path to the back kitchen door, where you can get food, and there's a pump for water. You can probably heat the water there, we've got plans to put a fireplace or something in here, but we haven't done it yet. Frankly I haven't done anything but sleep and paperwork here. I'll see you later."
A couple of hours later she brought him a tray of delicious little snacks on a plate, and a quarter of a bottle of wine. "That old lady, Mev, was making the most incredible things out of practically nothing! She poured something into the wine, said I should have some too." She flushed and looked down, "I guess being drunk can't hurt."
"Well this isn't enough for you to get drunk on, even if I didn't have any. But as you say, it can't hurt." he got off of the crate he was using as a chair—his desk was two crates—and rummaged, found a single tin mug. "Oh, dear. The ambiance is a bit shaky."
That actually got a giggle out of her.
He poured a generous cupful and sipped. "Where did she get this? It good." And it was going to mess with his resolve to go slow and gently with this one. She really was attractive. Elegant, not pretty in the conventional sense.
She took a sip, and blinked a bit. "I haven't ever tasted anything like that." She took another cautious sip and then handed it back.
Damn, it was good. He set it down between them and tried the little munchies. "These are good too. Now I'm going to regret siccing the corporal on her."
"She seemed a bit smug, said some man had good tastes and had singled her out." She sat down beside his crate and leaned on him. "I don't know why I was so afraid this morning. Nothing could be worse than the goats."
He stroked her glossy hair. "Have you eaten? Try these." He took another sip, let her finish what he'd poured. Tried to concentrate on his map, see where he needed to start . . . she rubbed her cheek on his thigh.
Command decision. The map could wait.
Chapter Twenty-six
Summer 1356
Island of Gendo, Cove Islands
The two galleons paralleled them all the way to Gendo, and one anchored near them where they anchored off the village of Vesid. The other was circling the island, checking for this invasion the Westerners seemed so sure of.
Neither the colonel nor the Sheep Man had been displeased by the ships' presence. The Sea King was not about to allow foreigners to invade. Meaning the Westerners. He still refused to believe in the wizards' powers or destination.
"I just hope we can persuade them to point those swords the other direction, once the wizards show up," the colonel commented quietly as they all toiled up the slopes of the volcano. All told, he'd brought only twenty of the King's Own, an escort for an emissary, not a fighting force.
Admiral Sevani had two hundred marines on the two ships. Either ship out-gunned the Westerner's lightly armed courier.
Rufi figured there was little chance of getting them to consider the Westerners friends and allies. They hadn't seen the four frigates that attacked the Petrel, they'd come to investigate the yelling and the Petrel's loss of way. However Nil had banished the wizards' illusion of invisibility, the effect hadn't extended far enough for diplomatic usefulness.
He paused on top of a bare rock ridge. The ocean rolled endlessly to the west. To the south, the top third of the mountain loomed, to the east, the rough terrain dropped away to a flat valley floor, most of it cultivated here, close to the village. The geometric fields showed the dark rich soil where it had been plowed, the bright green of sprouting crops and the straight lines of orchards. Further east the occasional wood lot expanded into forest. To the north, back the way they had come, a steep descent to the village of Vesid. More mountains rose beyond, and continued to the limits of sight.
"Don't get too attached to it." Admiral Sevani walked past the Westerners.
Rufi shook his head and visibly decided against trying to persuade him of their good intensions. Again. Nil was proceeding alone now. Even Lefty hung well back, as the old wizard climbed around to the seaward side. The witches turned the other way and searched out a path the other direction. Rufi waved the rest of his small escort after the witches. Then he crooked a finger at Oscar and Bran and followed Nil. The admiral split his fifty marines, and led the section following Nil.
The volcano had blown out the side of its crater, leaving the peak a semi-circle of stone. The low side was fractured and jagged, and lava flowed from several vents, flowing hot and liquid up here, cooling, but still too hot to touch where it entered the sea.
That they had seen yesterday when they arrived.
The Village of Vesid was home to perhaps four hundred souls, a mixture of fishermen, farmers with fields near enough that they lived here rather than inland, and people providing all the services those two groups needed. Even the Westerner's small group, twenty-nine all told, stretched the villager's ability to accommodate them. With the admiral requiring enough marines to out number the foreign men two-to-one always on hand, the village was swamped. Rufi had decided they should move themselves to a site where they would be less of a burden. He hoped they could hunt, otherwise his consideration would come to nothing.
The Admiral was not pleased with the idea, but was not interfering. Yet.
Nil waved them back as he approached the lava racing down the mountain. He stood and . . . stood, as far as Bran could tell. After about a hour, the wizard turned and walked back to them. "Well, shall we see if the Witches have found a good spot?" His eyes were bright, but somehow absent-minded, as if concentrating on something else.
"What were you doing, over there," the admiral demanded.
"Listening to the volcano, learning its feel, its rhythm." Nil tilted his head to look up at the ragged peak. "Very interesting, different than the volcanoes of northern Scoone. Of course, they're not erupting, right now."
"So you can't listen to them, anymore?" the admiral curled a sarcastic lip.
"Quite. Plus they're a bit far away."
The Witches had chosen a wide, bare slope of solid lava as the best place to stay. Nil closed his eye and stood for a long moment. "Yes this is a good place." He turned to the admiral. "They are here, they landed a week ago in Gendo Village."
"Nonsense. We've sighted no ships."
Rufi shrugged. "I know. You don't believe in magic, especially that someone might be able to escape your notice on the seas. I hate to say this, but they're going to get plenty of time to settle in and fortify, aren't they? Or we could march straight across and show them to you."
The Admiral spoke a bit nastily, "Yes, your ghost army is going to have plenty of time to settle in. And whatever your . . . ladies are planning, they'd best not get too comfortable."
Nil shrugged. "There is a small chance the wizards are foolish enough to come and attack us. We might as well prepare for that. And witches are good at pure, raw building."
The Admiral did a double take, and walked closer to the witches.
Rufi found a comfortable rock with a good view and settled down to watch the witches work. He'd read everything he could get his hands on; it hadn't taken him long to realize that they lacked a great deal of knowledge about what magic users of any sort could do.
The King's Mage had told him the witches were more powerful in the groups of three, the Triads, they formed. Now he could see Curious all alone, the three youngsters in a group, and the other three, standing in a triangle, facing in.
One group seemed to be breaking the rock in well controlled blocks, the other levitating the blocks into position. Curious appeared to be able to melt the stones to lock them into place.
They had shelters ready by nightfall. In two days they had a small walled fort with barracks for two hundred marines and smaller separate quarters for twenty-one Western soldiers. A large room the witches said was for all of them, and a small high room for Nil, with a larger unroofed platform above it.
The Admiral was twice as twitchy. Rufi sympathized. "So, does this display of magic make you more likely to believe the wizards we have been warning you about exist and are concealing themselves, or simply more suspicious of us?"
The admiral shuddered. "I don't like any of this. I have sent reports to the Sea King. If he says you must go, we will remove you, however many lives it takes."
Nil walked down as they spoke. "We will not fight you. We acknowledge the supremacy of the Sea King on his own Islands. If he says go, we will go peacefully."
The admiral snorted. "We'll see. I think I'll leave a few men to watch the ladies, and escort your group across the valley. Your excuses for the failure of your ploy should be entertaining. Or we could just stay here until one of the ships sees something."
"An excellent idea. Shall we?"
Rufi summoned his guards with a wave. The admiral narrowed his eyes and sent a trio of marines out to scout, then followed.
***
Jin's narrow bunk was replaced by a wide bed of rough green lumber, and the wood from the bunk reemerged as a functional desk.
The Corporal looked wistful and got a similar setup, in which the old cook seemed to be joining him regularly. She'd taken over the kitchen and didn't seem to be doing the whole century, a bit to his surprise.
The century had settled in happily and had chopped a path up around the nearest mountain and well up the volcano on its north-eastern flank. Not bad for two weeks.
He sat his horse now and waited while Orgaphos studied the map and the ground. The four peaks formed a small mountain range of their own, and Jin supposed that all the peaks were probably volcanoes. The tallest peak was the one in the south-east, and it was that one that Orgaphos seemed to be the most interested in, even though the north-eastern one was apparently the one that had erupted three years ago.
"General Inetricovski?" Orgaphos pointed with his human hand. "I will have my headquarters there and you will place your people about in such a way that if our friends across the Island decide to come calling, they won't reach the crest."
"Yes, sir, I'll have you covered on all sides." the General's eyes swung around to Jin. "Your Fifth Century is excellently placed." He smiled a little crookedly. "You started out as my least regarded officer. The sheer number of times you do exactly the right thing." He shook his head. "Old Gods, whoever you served under trained you right, and you seem to have a real knack for placement."
Jin felt his face heat. "Thank you, sir."
"Of course, that means that while everyone else is scrambling to catch up, you get to do most of the patrolling." The General's eyes slid to the map. "Work up a map showing where we need to relocate, and where we need roads."
"Yes, sir. May I assume the Horse Centuries need to be inland?"
"You may."
Orgaphos looked over. "Talk to me before you actually start building anything. The volcano, that cone specifically," he pointed to the south-eastern peak, "is near eruption. We may be able to direct roughly where it does so, and thus avoid damaging your positions. But we may not. I need to walk over it. Will you lead me, Captain Jin?"
"My honor, sir. We can ride perhaps another mile. After that . . . "
"No matter. I need to walk it, to feel the Fire beneath the surface."
It was an interesting, and long, day.
The wizard stopped every quarter mile or so, to stand still and quiet. Jin used the time for more detailed mapping. They circled the cone a thousand feet below the summit, And in the end, Orgaphos again consulted the old map.
"The deep magma is moving to the south-east. We will attempt to fracture the east wall of the mountain, to encourage the actual emergence of the lava out the side several thousand feet down from the summit. Captain Jin, get me a copy of your detailed map as soon as possible." He strode back to horses, mounted, and turned toward the village.
Jin met the General's eyes and shrugged. "If he says they can break the mountain, they probably can."
***
They made it to the thicker forests by nightfall, and camped. There was a well worn road through the forests, which they discovered was a thirty mile thick strip between the farmer's fields of the east and west sides of the island.
The inhabitants of the tiny village—eight houses for the families who farmed these fields—knew all about the people who were in Gendo.
"We stay away, especially the women. Especially the girls. One of their officers warned us, he said his masters needed virgins to break old spells." The farmer spat in the general direction of Gendo. "I think they just want all the young pretty ones."
The Admiral looked thoughtful, and pushed them on another twenty miles. They camped in a wood lot with a good view over the fields to the forested sides of the huge mountain. The snow on the peaks caught the light of the sun long after they were in solid darkness.
***
They were all ordered off the Mountain the day the wizards assembled to 'fracture' it.
Jin thought about erupting volcanoes, and tales of flying rocks, and decided it was a lovely day for field exercises.
He spoke to Cina and Mev before they left. "This might be an excellent day for all you women to, oh, walk down to an inland village and maybe buy some cloth, or whatever else you need. Maybe plan on being gone by noon and coming back late?" He dispensed
coin, which was not flowing as easily as it had when they were sitting on the gold mines, and led the troops out.
From an extra ten miles distance, they experimented a bit with fighting up and down the small ridges common to this terrain, and Jin rotated small groups through exercises with various team leaders.
They were taking a break for water when the ground shook and shivered for several minutes. The boom of a massive explosion rolled through, a slap of wind flattening trees as it passed.
Jin stepped out to where he could see the sky to the south east. A column of dark grey smoke rose from the vicinity of the mountain.
"What is that?" Corporal Lebonift shifted uneasily.
"I believe that is a volcano erupting." Jin shaded his eyes. "And hopefully our lords and masters retreated expeditiously."
"Hopefully?" The Corporal caught his eye and dropped his gaze, "Sorry, sir, it's just, they're so uncanny."
Jin sighed. "Yes. But they saved me, pulled you out of the mines and healed you . . . If I'm not going to be loyal to the people who did that, then I must not be capable of loyalty."
The Corporal nodded, not looking up. "That doesn't make them good men."
"No. Just good leaders." Jin studied the smoke. it was spreading now, stretching out to cover the horizon, and closing in. "All right, get the men up. Since we haven't been blown up, I think we'd best get back to the fort."
He quick marched them around the flats, and then up the steepest climb to the fort, in the interests of getting there quickly. The dark clouds had spread to cover most of the sky, and a dry snow of grey flakes was sifting down from above.
The women had already returned, and they seemed relieved to have their men back.
Jin dismissed the troops, and stationed a minimal guard with short rotations.
"You knew this was going to happen?" Cina joined him in the mess hall.
"I suspected, and it made me a bit nervous. No need for the exercise today, sorry, troops!"
Cina snickered. "I'm not sorry, I found some really pretty material."