The greencoats had corralled the villagers onto the beach.
All the joy went out of me at once. The island’s residents were flushed scarlet, their fingers swollen, their arms and legs covered in a blotchy red-pink rash. The greencoats kept them at spears length and covered their mouths.
“What have we done?” I asked of no one. “What sickness is this?”
Gern and Mercanfur rushed down the pier.
I noticed a smell in the air then, too. On the far side of the beach, several dozen miserable men and women huddled in a stand of trees with nothing more than a few sheets hung in the branches for shelter. A line of bodies lay on their faces farther down the beach.
“Stay where you are,” I told Gern. He was abashed. “You could already be sick. We cannot—we will not bring this sickness back to Urnedi.”
He began to protest, but Mercanfur nodded reluctantly. “She’s right. Whatever this sickness is, they have it bad. A fever went through Trace when I was young, and it killed one in twenty. This looks much worse. We cannot carry this back to Enhedu.”
“I’ll go back for Geart,” I said. “You stay here.”
“Can he cure it?” Gern asked and looked back at his men guarding the prisoners.
“He’ll have to,” I said and waved the men to cast off.
“Good work against those boats,” Mercanfur said with what cheer he could manage.
“I didn’t get them all. You can expect they’ll try to cross to the island with what they have left. There is a scrubby town of several thousand up that hill. Who knows how many more live up in the valleys. You are outnumbered.”
“What of our mission to arrest Haton?” Gern asked.
“It must wait,” I said. “I’ll be back in two days. Count on it.”
“Be swift,” Mercanfur said as the sails caught the wind.
I saluted him while Gern shouted orders for the construction of breastworks.
The Grace gathered way, and we made for Urnedi.
45
General Leger Mertone
Many Days Later
“Rot. Who stole my wine?”
I knocked over the table next to my cot and punched around the bottles that littered my tent. The place stank. I checked my neck and groin for the wounds that should have killed me. More scars.
“I had two of them right here last night. Who took my wine?”
I stumbled out into a bright midday sun. My feet sank into rain-soaked turf, and I stumbled.
The lieutenant on guard caught me by the armpit and hefted me upright. “A bath and breakfast, General?”
Wafts of boiled fish and some kind of fresh berry collided in my nose.
“No,” I said as I found my feet. “Wine.”
“Yes, sir,” he replied and started away. “I will return at once.”
I recalled the battle—my charge out against the rioting Raydau, the pain of my wounds, and my dismay at their retreat.
Cowards.
“That rotting smoke,” I said.
“Excuse me, General?” the lieutenant said and came to a halt. “Do you refer to the battle? That was twelve days ago now.”
“That cursed smoke from Osburth. It made them run,” I said. “Where will I have to go to find men who won’t turn tail?”
“Detree’s boys seem fit, sir. They’d stand their ground.”
“They are on our side, Lieutenant.”
He shrugged. “The Raydau don’t look like they are going to pack it in again, either,” he said with a frown.
It took me a moment to understand him. He knew I was chasing death. “Do others know?”
“No one here. They all think your charge was genius.”
“You’re that messenger,” I said and recalled the arrival of a greencoat disguised as a priest who brought news of Heneur and the sack of Osburth. The details were dizzying. “Don’t you have something to go fetch?”
“Sir,” he replied with a salute and left me to my view.
The Raydau had returned to the hill that I had chased them off of and in much greater numbers. The tents of their commanders were packed in the shade offered by the trees atop the low and long terrace that cut diagonally across the large hill. The Raydau’s army was layered around them like folds of dirty blankets. It was not a proud force.
“Hold,” I said and waved the young officer back. “How many are we and they?”
“We have 2,400 Cynt regulars in camp with us and another 500 of their levies—useless levies. Your six companies of mixed greencoat and auxiliaries are all in fine shape. One of the two companies of Tracian regulars took it hard during the battle. Captain Lenum was killed. We are 5,000 all together. The Raydau number closer to 8,000. Half are made of the levies that ran for home the first time around. The two battalions of infantry right there are what they think they can beat us with. That and the blessings of Bayen.”
“Excuse me?”
“The Cynt won’t speak of it, but the church holds sway here. Prince Barok’s move against the priests of the Oreol has upset some of the Cynt men. We lose some of them from camp every day. The Raydau have been gathering in even greater number.”
“What move did Barok make?”
“Soma and some ships out of Heneur sacked Osburth. That was the smoke that routed the Raydau. There was a priest and sermod there. The priest was killed. The sermod survived, and she is stirring up the Raydau,” he said. I spotted a trio of tall tents far back on the Raydau’s hill, black with red stripes.
Fantastic.
“Barok named Avinda his Chief Prelate, which makes all the priests of the Oreol his. They don’t like it, and a couple of priests out of Moorsmoth have joined the sermod. We get to pretend twice a day to love Bayen when they come out and recite the creed.”
His speech on the topic sounded familiar. “We have had this conversation before.”
“Three mornings in a row, sir. Yes.”
“What else do I ask before you bring me the wine I demand?”
“Things that have disinterested you,” he replied.
Smart ass.
“And what do you judge would interest me?”
“Your plan for defeating them and burning those priests alive.”
“I have one? I’ve told it to you?”
“No, sir. Not as of yet. Shall I call up the captains to hear it?”
“Wise ass little shit. Go get my wine,” I said. “And the next time you take the bottle I’ve left myself, I will have your coat and spear.”
He saluted me and turned.
“Scratch that,” I said with a shout after another glance out at the enemy. “Those, right there?” I said and stabbed my finger at the disordered clusters of men upon the far hill. They were out of their armor, drinking, and laughing. “Those are their best?”
“A fit force, so the Cynt believe. The cousins are urging us to negotiate. Haton is spending your gold by the ten-weight to keep them in camp.”
“I want every man with a horse ready to make a charge by the time I report forward.”
“Another charge, sir?” he asked.
I grabbed him by the neck of his leather bevor and pulled him close. “Describe the ground between us and those battalions. Don’t look, damn you. Tell me what we have to cross to get at their best men and through to the nobles who are paying for all of this.”
“A thick picket of staves and thousands of men, sir.”
“The levies are inconsequential. I asked you to describe the ground.”
“Sir?” he asked, and I shook him once for it.
“As if you were walking from here to there. Tell me what is beneath your feet.”
He understood then, and with it went his fear of me. He closed his eyes in concentration. “A slow grassy slope down into the trough between the two hills. It is marshy there for a short distance, with water running off to the north. Their picket of pine staves is staked into the ground just beyond that, eight-paces worth of them. After that, you are up onto rockier soil.
The levies are there upon a fractured table of limestone, and the battalions of infantry camped above them is on a higher, drier, and wider sheet of it. A short cliff rises up behind them from southeast to northwest. Its topside is heavily forested. Their nobles and priests have their tall tents tucked up against the cliff.”
“Now, tell me how we’ll get a company across into their noblemen’s tents and back before those drunken fools know we’ve come.”
“The ground,” he said excitedly and grabbed my shoulders. “It’s so soft from the rain that their pickets will pull up like nothing. We’ll be able to charge straight at them.”
“We don’t even need to pull them up,” I told him. “Two horses with a heavy rope drawn between them can tip them. The rest of the company can walk the brief swamp while it is being done and charge up onto the rocky ground without a thing in the world to stop them but a few farmers and drunks.”
“I’ll pass the word,” he said and trotted away.
I found my clothes and armor folded neatly upon a cedar luggage stand in one corner—all of it spotless, despite me.
I hurried into it and ran outside. I could hear the low noise of cavalry assembling inside the fort. I marched up through the gates and into the nearby paddock. They were ready and looked eager. The Fell Ponies were calm as tempered steel. Every one of them was head up and sniffing the last of the morning’s cool air. Their long tails and the long hair that usually flared upon their legs and flowed down over their hooves was groomed well back. I was glad for this. The long hair did not like the kind of muck we’d churn through.
The men came to a halt as though I were a ghost wafting in. I spat, found my speckled gray stallion, and drew my sword before any of them noticed my hands shaking or that it was getting worse.
“Riders up,” I called, “and form on me.” They jumped to it, and I pointed at the clever officer. “Collect Haton and go let Detree and Cassin know that I expect them to follow on.”
“And if they won’t?”
“Whatever it takes. Bribe them, threaten them—kill a Cynt cousin or two if you have to—I don’t care. I want their horses in behind us, and the rest, too, if you can manage it. Got me, Lieutenant?”
“On it, sir,” he hollered, his horse already moving.
The rest of my cavalry was in the saddle, and I got us moving out.
To my captains of foot, I said as we passed, “Move the archers forward after we are through the picket. Aim for any horse you see. We’ll need to get back here when we’re done with as few in pursuit as possible. Be ready to withdraw yourselves.”
“Sir!”
And then we were moving. My hungry stomach woke and bit me, but too late. Leather, horseflesh, and steel had grabbed me first. I aimed us toward the wettest looking patch of the trough between the two hills.
My senior cavalry captain had a heavy coil of rope hanging off the back of his saddle—an important detail.
I asked him, “Have we been sending riders down to the picket with messages?”
“Yes. Fewer of late, though. The thinking amongst the men was that we were waiting for the ground to dry before drawing them in to attack us again. Glad to see we’re not waiting around.”
The rest nodded their agreement.
I would have said more, but I threw up into my mouth and needed to choke it back down. I was just blinking the water from my eyes and clearing my nose when we started down into the tall soggy grass between the two armies.
The Raydau looked on with considerable interest but gave us little real regard after I waved all but my captain to a halt. We rode forward alone.
A Raydau man started the long way down rather lazily. The lot of them looked like men waiting for us to surrender.
I hefted the thick coils off the back of my captain’s saddle. He dismounted and helped me fix the heavy line between our two saddles. We mounted and started toward the picket with the center of the rope hung slightly above the ground.
My Fell grew nervous as I nudged him between the chest-high staves. The rope caught on the first dozen that had been hammered into the ground between the captain and I. Nothing calms a Fell like a hard pull against a rope, and the pair dug in and pressed their wide hooves into the soft earth. Muck began to arc high into the air, and the staves began to move. The rope slipped farther up the tipping staves, and one after another was levered over. My stallion got his nose free of the forest of spears and gave the ground a thrashing. The rest were toppled over all at once.
Behind us, the rest of my company was already close at hand. I urged them on and turned to see what the enemy had gotten ready for us.
The levies stood stupidly around their campfires, and the men of the Raydau’s great battalions were only just starting to notice that this was more than a message coming forward.
My cavalry surged through the gap, and I started them up.
No one told the levies what to do. They watched as we rode onto them, and when I raised my sword and ordered the charge, they ran. As soon as the screaming started, panic took them and the slaughter began.
The Raydau professionals were jumping to their gear and into ranks, but we pressed the fleeing levies at them and were near full pace when we crashed upon them. They broke back from us like the weakly-planted staves, and my men got busy with their spears. The company slowed from the wealth of drunken, half-dressed targets around us.
“Through!” I yelled. “Forward!”
My greencoats were quick to it, and we clattered across the mossy limestone and into the tents and personal guard of the Raydau noblemen. It hardly even counted as a fight. Their tents came down, and the men inside died on spears or were shot through with arrows.
I got ready to aim us at the priests. Several of the boys had already made it across. The tents came down, but no one was inside. I scoffed, unsurprised at their cowardice, and turned toward Olum Raydau’s command tent.
A lone greencoat had already cut his way through the weak perimeter of the staggered guards and was leaping from his horse like a madman to take Olum and his men by himself.
“Surrender,” he screamed and killed two of the half-dozen bodyguards with savage thrusts of his spear. “Surrender yourselves, or die.”
It was the lieutenant. I didn’t understand where he’d come from. I looked back down the hill, concerned he’d forgotten his orders, but Detree had galloped his horse archers through the picket and was treating the fleeing levies badly. The rest of the Cynt were moving up in support of my archers, whose flights of heavy arrows made the broken battalions pay.
I looked back at the lieutenant. Olum Raydau and his guards were upon their knees. The lieutenant pulled a long white cloth from his saddlebag and threw it at the defeated headman. Olum’s purple pennant was taken down, and the white was hoisted up for all to see. It looked like the sheet from my cot.
And it was over. The Raydau all across the field stumbled back from us and went down upon a knee. I’d not swung my sword once.
I should have rejoiced at the ending the kid had found for us. I puked, instead, and fell from my horse.
46
Geart Goib
Pemini’s house was across the street from the Constant Pony. I paused at the door. A Chaukai veteran I knew was doing his best to sweep the street while the people came and went around him. He was dressed down to a worn tunica and dusty boots and was armed with nothing but an old broom and bin. He ignored me, and I ignored him.
Barok was keeping tabs on someone. I was glad it wasn’t me.
I found Pemini inside. She was sitting on a chair with my barbute helmet in one hand and an oiled cloth in the other, working on a spot of tarnish like an old sergeant. The room smelled of the oil and of her.
“Are you still not feeling well?” she asked and set the helmet back in the chest. “Should I call Avin?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Geart Goib, don’t tell me it’s nothing. I grew up with a house full of men hiding their hurts, and nothing good ever
came of it.”
She led me to the table. She had food waiting and dished out a hefty bowl of carrot and potato soup. Somewhere in the back of my head it occurred to me that she was not at the keep as her duty demanded. Dia’s doing.
“Everyone is trying so hard to help me,” I said. “I’m not used to it.”
“We are just trying to repay you,” she said. “And some of us love you.”
“The soup is really good.” I said. She smiled and waited quietly. I wasn’t getting off the hook. Not again in this lifetime.
I said to her, “Barok needed me to heal a man three days back. I had to use a bit of the white.”
“Did it invite back the Shadow?”
“I’m not sure. It spent a piece of me. I’m starting to think there is a limit to how much I can sing—how much anyone can sing. Soma warned me that she would not be able to pull me back from the Shadow a second time. I might need to stop singing for good soon.”
She found a bowl for herself, sat down across from me, and kicked off her shoes. Her toes were marching up my leg before she sipped her first spoonful. “We all like you better as a teacher than a singer anyway. Perhaps it is for the best.”
Someone knocked at the door. We ignored it happily, got up from the table, and started hand-in-hand for the bedroom.
“Geart, its Barok and Soma. Open up.”
Pemini rushed across and opened the door for him. “Please, my lord and lady, come in.”
Avin, Ryat, and Horace followed them in. I did not like the looks on their faces.
“What is it?” I asked.
Barok motioned to Soma, and she detailed their attack upon the corsair island and the sickness they encountered.
“We think it could be red fever,” Avin said. Ryat nodded his agreement.
“Do you know how to cure it?” I asked.
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