The Return of the Black Company

by Cook, Glen

  Smoke could not find him.

  It took me a while to comprehend that Smoke might have been primed to shy away from what Goblin was doing. Maybe to keep One-Eye from finding out and interfering. It would be just like the little shit to blow a whole operation because he did not think before pulling some nasty practical joke on his friend.

  I did some experimenting. Sure enough, Smoke had been given some special instructions. The Old Man had not given up visiting him completely.

  Once I knew that, I had little difficulty getting past Croaker’s safeguards. I fear One-Eye would have had little more trouble.

  I found Goblin standing on a sandy beach far down the uncharted coast of the Shindai Kus, a terrible desert that fills a vast chunk of land between the northern and southern regions of the Shadowlands. The impassable mountains called the Dandha Presh only get shorter out there before they finally wade into the ocean.

  Goblin was looking out to sea. A ship rode her anchor inshore. Boats were plunging in the surf. Goblin was yammering a litany of complaints. From the faces of his companions it was safe to guess that they had heard it all before.

  What the hell was Goblin doing out there on that bleak coast?

  I dropped back in time to listen in from the beginning.

  Goblin was tormented by hatreds. So what does the Captain do? He sends nobody else but Goblin himself off to chart the unknown coast. Goblin hated swamps. So naturally the first leg of the journey took him downriver through the delta, which was one huge swamp two hundred miles across, without one decent channel, obviously totally unfit for human habitation because only Nyueng Bao lived there.

  Goblin hated sea travel almost as much as One-Eye did. So what did he get after cutting through the swamp, damned near building a canal to manage that? A goddamn ocean with waves taller than any self-respecting tree. He hated deserts. So what did he find after he finally got his little fleet past the end of the swampy coast? Country so barren scorpions and sand fleas could not make a living there. You baked during the day and froze at night and you never got away from the sand. The wind blew it into everything. He had sand in his boots right now.…

  “I wasn’t born for this,” Goblin complained. “Nobody deserves this. Me less than most. What did I ever do to the Old Man? All right, so maybe me and One-Eye drink a little and get rowdy sometimes, but so what? It’s just youthful high spirits if Sleepy does it.”

  Naturally he overlooked the fact that when he and One-Eye get drunk they always start squabbling and tend to begin throwing sloppily woven spells around, busting things up far worse than Sleepy ever could.

  “A man has to cut loose sometimes, you know what I mean? Nobody ever gets hurt, do they?” That was not an exaggeration, that was an outright fabrication. “Hell, in a world where there was any shred of justice I’d be retired somewhere where the wine is sweet and the girls appreciate a man with experience. I gave the Company the best centuries of my life.”

  Goblin hated being in charge. That meant having to think and make decisions. And it meant taking responsibility. Goblin hated all those things, too. He just wanted to cruise through life doing only what was necessary to get by while somebody else did the thinking and made the decisions.

  Goblin hated hard work, too, and in this desert everybody was going to have to bust ass to stay alive.

  I had Smoke take me up high, with the eagles—had any been able to survive out there—to see what had Goblin so excited.

  He had not exaggerated about the desert.

  Near the coast the Shindai Kus was all golden sand. The surf brought that in from the deep. Continuous gales carried that sand inland, using it to scour the skin off hills that, as they grew up and marched to the east, became the Dandha Presh. On the coast few of the hills stood more than a hundred feet above the sand. None of those showed the least sign of water erosion. It had not rained there for a thousand years.

  I started to descend. Goblin and two others were walking inland slowly, testing the surface. Something exploded out of the sand ahead. An impossible something. A monster that could not exist in this world, a devil thing the size of an elephant but with more legs and hair than a tarantula plus some squidlike tentacles and a scorpion’s tail thrown in for good measure. It staggered around groggily. Obviously it had lain there a long time, awaiting the footsteps that called it forth.

  Goblin’s companions fled. The little wizard cursed and said, “Another thing I hate is things that jump up out of the sand.” While the monster was still woozy he hit it with some of his best stuff.

  Something like a yard wide, a three-legged stained-glass throwing star appeared in his hand. He used it like a throwing star. The monster bellowed in outrage as the star clipped a couple tentacles and several legs off its right side. It tried to charge Goblin, who elected for the better part of valor and hauled ass.

  The monster sort of dragged itself around in a big circle, leaving ruts in the golden sand. It lost interest in the men on the beach. For a while it tried to put its severed limbs back on but the graft would not take. Finally, it just sort of shuddered fatalistically and began to dig itself back down into the sand with the limbs it still had.

  “And another thing,” Goblin complained, “I hate the whole concept of the Shaded Road.”

  Shaded Road was some secret project kept from me because I had had no need to know. I had overheard the name mentioned once or twice.

  “I’m even beginning to wonder how much I like Croaker. This shit is pure insanity. I hope the son of a bitch gets to spend his afterlife in a place like this.”

  No more need to check up on Goblin. He was fine. Like any good soldier, if he was bitching he was perfectly all right.

  I went back to Dejagore.

  I came back into myself inside One-Eye’s wagon. I was starving and thirsty. Smoke smelled bad. “One-Eye! I have to get something to eat. Where’s the transients’ mess?”

  The little black man stuck his disgusting hat into the wagon. I could barely make out his equally ugly face. It must be getting dark out already.

  “For us it’s in the citadel.”

  “Isn’t that wonderful. Maybe I won’t eat the meat.” Mogaba and his cronies, still on our side then, had sat out the siege in the citadel, dining on the occasional hapless citizen of Jaicur.

  “Pretend it’s chicken, it ain’t so bad,” One-Eye said, just to turn my stomach. His nose wrinkled. “Smells in here.”

  “I told you. You’d better get him cleaned up.”

  He tried out his baleful stare. It did not work. I said, “You have to live with him.”

  10

  I thought Croaker would want to catch up with Lady. They had not seen one another for a while. But he seemed content to rest at Dejagore, communing with his dark messengers more and more.

  The crows troubled those of the Old Crew whose duties tied them to Dejagore. Candles and Wheezer came to me complaining. I told them, “He’s the boss. I guess he can like crows if he wants.” I studied Wheezer closely, unable to believe his disease had not killed him yet. He coughed almost continuously now.

  “It’s what the natives think about them,” Candles said. “They’re bad omens to everybody but Stranglers.”

  “I have a feeling they’ll be really bad omens for anybody who starts complaining about them. Wheezer, you on permanent assignment here?”

  The old man hacked his way around an affirmative answer.

  “Good. I don’t think you ought to be in the field at this time of year.”

  “What good will it do to leave me back here to die alone?”

  “You’re going to outlive me, you stubborn old fart.”

  “I’m part of this thing now. You people all the time tell us about our history and now we got a chance to find the beginning place.… I’m going to be there.”

  I nodded, accepting that. That was his right.

  That made me reflect on how different we were from other mercenary bands I have seen. There was almost no bullying or bru
tality among the men. Historically you would not have gotten in if you were the sort of shit who made himself feel good by causing pain to those around you. And if you did chances were you would not survive long.

  The history and culture and brotherhood stuff is laid on early and often and if you survive long enough to give it a chance you usually go for it.

  Croaker, of course, was the ultimate disciple of the Company thing. And he was able to sell everyone else. Except Mogaba. And Mogaba’s main problem with the brotherhood was that Mogaba was not in charge.

  Not really relevant, except to indicate that we are not a band of misfit brutes. We are a sensitive bunch of misfits who try to care about our brothers. Most of the time.

  One-Eye appeared and invited himself into the conversation, ignoring Wheezer even though the old lunger was from his own homeland. “Hey, Kid, I just saw the Troll trundling along Glimmers Like Dewdrops Street. You sure you don’t know where Goblin is? I got to get those two together.”

  The Troll is what her own people call Mother Gota behind her back. She is even nastier to them than to us outsiders. We have an excuse. We were not born Nyueng Bao.

  I told One-Eye, “They made real good time considering the way she walks.” My mother-in-law walks like she is terminally bowlegged and has no joints in her legs, rolling like a fat merchantman in heavy seas.

  The little black man slipped a glance sidelong at Thai Dei, who was handy as always when not specifically told to stay away. Thai Dei showed signs of actual emotion. One-Eye was hoping he was not offended to the point where he was going to go flailing around.…

  I whispered, “Even he calls her the Troll sometimes. But do be more circumspect.” Louder, I asked, “What about Uncle Doj?”

  “Didn’t see him.”

  “Thai Dei. You’d better find your mother.” Uncle Doj would find us. When it suited him.

  Everybody watched Thai Dei go. When he was out of earshot I murmured, “I never missed her for an instant.” I hoped Thai Dei would find some way to prolong my joy.

  One-Eye snickered.

  I said, “You ask me, she’s the perfect woman for you, not Goblin.”

  “Bite your tongue, Kid.”

  “I mean it.”

  “You got a sick sense of humor. And you got the Old Man aggravated.”

  “Huh? How?”

  “Way he told it, you’re a couple days overdue with your standard reports.”

  “Oh-oh.” That was not entirely true but it was close. “I’ll get on it right away.”

  “Still wearing your bracelet?”

  “Uh…” I got it. “Yeah.”

  “Good. You’ll need it.”

  Candles and Wheezer had no idea what we were talking about. But Candles did offer a good bit of advice as I departed. “Mind the crows,” he told me.

  The crows did seem to be interested in me lately. I did not like that, but it did make sense from a viewpoint other than my own. I was very close to Croaker. Soulcatcher would want to keep an eye on me, too.

  The old saw applied. Forewarned was forearmed.

  * * *

  I needed to catch up on events since last I had had time to spend with Smoke. I should have been surveying the front instead of checking up on Goblin. Croaker did not want to know about Goblin. Whatever the little shit was doing, it was so secret nobody was supposed to know.

  The string on my wrist allowed me to approach One-Eye’s wagon without becoming disoriented or distracted, just as it had done in the maze of the Palace. The crows following me though, began to get confused while we were still a quarter mile away. They lost me.

  I wondered if that was all good. That sort of thing was sure to arouse Soulcatcher’s curiosity—if she had time free from her other schemes.

  I wondered if Smoke’s attitude toward Soulcatcher would be different out here, if I could get him to stalk her now that he was away from the Palace. Always, while we were there, his soul stubbornly refused to play along whenever I tried to spy on Lady’s mad sister.

  I climbed into the wagon and made myself comfortable. It looked as though One-Eye had been doing a little ghostwalking of his own. Food and water were available in large quantities. I have to eat and drink a lot when I go out a lot. Ghostwalking sucks the fluid and energy out of you fast. I can see the trap there. The world Smoke walks is so comforting you could easily forget that you have to come back to eat. You could end up just like Smoke.

  After a long drink and a sugar bun I lay down on the smelly mat and closed my eyes, reached out and took hold of Smoke’s soul. He seemed vaguely troubled. Usually he is blandly empty. I could find no proximate cause for his discomfort. Maybe One-Eye was not taking care of his physical needs well enough. I had best check. After I ran my circuit.

  I went out and watched the Taglian brushfire crackle through feeble Shadowlander defenses. The southerners were still groggy from the earthquake. Many places their collapse was so swift it had no chance to become a rout.

  Confused reports began to reach Mogaba at Charandaprash. He relayed them to Longshadow. The Shadowmaster remained convinced that we could not manage a major winter offensive, that this was just another of Croaker’s clever attempts to direct attention away from what he was really doing.

  Longshadow was getting his reports without help from Howler. The misshapen, tortured little sorcerer seemed to be on vacation. I could not find him.

  Narayan Singh and the Daughter of Night were holed up in a Strangler tagalong encampment near Mogaba’s main force at Charandaprash. I am not sure why but the child caught my interest. I began to roam back and forth in time, studying her. I grew troubled. I had found something the Old Man needed to know.

  His daughter had some way of scrying distant events, though not as intimately as Smoke did. So far nobody, not even Singh, was listening to her, but they would when Narayan realized that all her vague oracles hit their marks.

  She seemed to go into a trance each time. I wanted to study that more closely but Smoke rebelled. And this time I am not sure I blamed him. That child had an aura about her that made you shudder and think of tombs and things best left buried even out there in the emotionless space that Smoke walked.

  Lady was far to the south of Dejagore, pushing herself and her soldiers. She looked extremely haggard, though hardly showing her age since she makes One-Eye look like a pup. Willow Swan, with the Royal Guards, was in her train, as was the Prahbrindrah Drah, who claimed he had to be there in order to coordinate his efforts with hers. I do not think he fooled anyone but himself. Lady was short enough of temper that she did not put up with any moon-eyed crap from anybody.

  Swan was troubled. The Prince was baffled. I eavesdropped on several conversations where they tried to reason out what was bothering Lady. They came up with no ideas and Lady offered no clues herself. Once again she was content to keep the bleakness and pain of her interior world to herself.

  I supposed after a life as long as hers, as alone, as tormented when she was the wife of the Dominator, coming out and petitioning the help of lesser beings seemed pointless, though she was one of us maggots herself, now. More or less.

  In defiance of all that was known by amateurs and experts alike, her lost powers had been coming back for years. She was not the Lady who had built the empire up north, so strong she kept ten like the Howler on leashes, as hounds to bay before her and do her dark bidding, but she was strong enough to trouble Howler and Longshadow and, I am sure, her sister Soulcatcher.

  That was another wedge that had come between Croaker and Lady. The Old Man does not trust the side of her that loves the darkness. She had been too intimate with it for too long.

  He fears losing her. I am afraid he is driving her away because he is not dealing with his fears very well.

  Lady was becoming the terror of all who resisted her advance, that was certain. That advance was crueler than the earthquake wherever anyone fought back.

  I found my Company brethren in the thick of the action everywhere, lead
ing this band or that. Their Nyueng Bao bodyguards stayed busy. Though they were weak after years of being hunted down by Croaker and Lady, the Deceivers were aptly named. Those who remained alive were the most skilled of their kind and they shunned no opportunity to strike at the Company in honor of their goddess.

  Though Mogaba had several thousand horsemen moving north they were not yet involved in the fighting. Of Shadowlander forces in the regions being swamped only Blade’s bunch had not been caught flatfooted. And Blade, after a couple of brisk—and for him very satisfactory—encounters with regiments raised by Taglian religious leaders, was making little effort to hold any territory. He was falling back toward Charandaprash at a pace just fast enough to make certain our forces did not get behind him.

  His whole area of operations was becoming infested with the religious bands. Ever since their falling-out Croaker had been allowing the priests to go after Blade virtually independent of the rest of the military. Blade hated priests and never hid that fact. Working with the Shadowmaster gave him an opportunity to express his hatred fully. In turn, the priesthoods were determined to silence him forever.

  The Old Man seemed perfectly happy to allow the priests, who had a strong tradition of intrigue and interference in secular events, to spend their treasure and energy and most devout followers trying to rid him of someone he detested.

  As he retreated Blade kept drawing those guys in and destroying them. For a general with no formal training he did a great job of taking advantage of his enemies’ blind spots.

  All across the south forces from both sides drifted toward the Plain of Charandaprash. The big show would take place there before much longer. Certainly before winter turned.

  I came and went with Smoke. Time passed, almost without meaning. The Old Man got us onto the road again. I scarcely noticed. I was too busy with Smoke. Croaker did not like me being in the wagon all the time but there was so much going on so many places that he had to put up with it in order to get the information he wanted. Though his attitude could shift with the breeze.