Abban straightened. ‘That is not for you to know. Take me to Drillmaster Qeran, and be quick about it.’
Shusten snarled. ‘Do not take that tone with your betters, khaffit!’
Abban snapped a cold glare at him. ‘You may have inherited your mother’s steel, boy, but obviously not her brains if you would hinder the will of Shar’Dama Ka. Go find something useful to do or the next time I speak with him, I will mention to the Deliverer how his Sharum waste their days playing Sharak and drinking couzi when they should be training.’
The boys blanched at that, glancing at each other before hurrying off. Abban felt a cold satisfaction, but it did nothing to stem the blood from the knife twisting in his heart. That other men sneered at him for his crippled leg and coward’s heart, Abban had learned to live with. But a man that did not have the respect of his own sons was no man at all.
Soon, he promised himself. Soon.
Many of the Sharum flouted the restrictions of the Evejah, drinking couzi to give them courage in the night, and to forget the nights in the day. Few, though, were fool enough to get so drunk they could not stand at attention should a dama pass them by.
Qeran was that drunk and more. The drillmaster sat on a stained pillow with his back supported by the tent’s central pole, his black robes wet and stinking of vomit. Next to him lay his fine warded spear, a special crossbar added to allow him to use the weapon as a crutch. His left leg ended just below the knee, the leg of his pantaloons pinned back. Strapped to the stump was a simple wooden peg.
He glared at Abban as the khaffit entered, small eyes hard with hatred. ‘Come to gloat, khaffit? I’m nearly as useless as you now, but at least my place in Heaven is secure.’
Abban let the tent flap fall closed, leaving the two men alone. Then he spat at Qeran’s feet.
‘I am not useless, Drillmaster. I serve our master every day, and never once have I whined like a woman over my fate, much less drunk myself into a piss pool. Everam blessed you with a strong body, but I see without it, your heart is weak.’
Qeran’s face twisted with rage and he grabbed for his spear, meaning to leap to his feet and thrust it through Abban’s heart. But he was new to his wooden leg, and unsteady from the couzi. He stumbled, and it was all the time Abban needed to strike the peg hard with his crutch, knocking it clean off the drillmaster’s leg. As Qeran fell, he struck again, knocking away the spear.
The drillmaster hit the ground hard, and there was a click as Abban’s hidden blade snapped open, pointing right between his eyes.
‘You have killed many demons in your day, Drillmaster,’ Abban said, ‘but will even your place in Heaven remain secure if you are killed in your own filth by the crippled khaffit you cast from sharaj in shame?’
Qeran remained still a long time, his hard eyes nearly crossed as they watched the blade hovering at the bridge of his nose. ‘What do you want?’ he said at last.
Abban smiled, stepping back and retracting his blade so he could lean on his crutch as he bowed. From within his brightly coloured vest he produced the scroll marked with the Deliverer’s seal. ‘Why, to make you great again.’
Abban and Qeran drew many stares as they limped through the training ground toward the Kaji khaffit’sharaj. The drillmaster had been stripped by one of the jiwah’Sharum, doused in clean water, and dressed in fresh blacks. Abban knew without doubt that his head was pounding from the couzi as he squinted in the bright light of day, but the drillmaster had recovered something of himself and showed nothing of his discomfort. His back was straight as he walked, head high. As was the custom, Abban walked a step behind him, though he could easily have outpaced the slow gait Qeran required to walk with dignity.
They came to a section of grounds where tan-robed kha’Sharum trained – thousands in the Kaji tribe alone. Most practised the simple spear and shield forms Abban remembered from what seemed a lifetime ago, turning in unison, shields overlapping as they thrust their spears as one. A smaller group practised more advanced techniques.
Qeran spat. ‘Most of these men should still be in bidos, or better yet carrying water and polishing shields.’
A handful of young Sharum walked the ranks. They wore black, but the veils hanging loose around their necks were tan, marking them as khaffit drillmasters.
‘Pups,’ Qeran sneered, ‘sharpening their teeth on khaffit in hope of earning the red.’
One of the young drillmasters caught sight of them and approached, eyeing them with wary disdain until his eyes lighted on Qeran’s red veil. His eyes flicked up and lit with recognition as he met the drillmaster’s face. Qeran had been among the Spears of the Deliverer, and his reputation was well known. He and Drillmaster Kaval had trained the Shar’Dama Ka himself.
The young drillmaster bowed, ignoring Abban completely. ‘I am Hamash asu Gimas am’Tesan am’Kaji.’
Qeran returned his bow with a slight nod. ‘I trained your father. Gimas was a fierce warrior. He died well in the Maze.’
Hamash bowed again, more deeply this time. ‘What brings you to the khaffit’sharaj, honoured Drillmaster?’
Abban limped forward, holding out his writ. Drillmasters, like kai’Sharum, were given special training that included letters and warding, but from the way Hamash’s brow furrowed as he stared at the writ, he had obviously fallen short in his lessons.
Abban let the failing pass. It was to his advantage. ‘The Deliverer requires ten of your best kha’Sharum. I am to select them.’
‘You, a khaffit, mean to select warriors?’ Hamash said, eyes flicking to Qeran.
Abban smiled. ‘Who better? They are khaffit warriors, after all.’
‘Warriors, still,’ the young drillmaster growled.
‘Drillmaster Qeran will ensure they are fit to fight,’ Abban said. ‘I am to ensure they have brains in their heads.’
‘Only ten?’ Qeran asked quietly, too low for Hamash to hear. ‘You told me the Shar’Dama Ka commanded a hundred.’
‘The Deliverer has no tribe, Drillmaster,’ Abban said. ‘We will select ten from each.’
‘That is more than a hundred,’ Qeran said. There were twelve tribes of Krasia.
Smart for a Sharum, Abban mused. ‘I remember your training methods well, Drillmaster. There will be those who will not survive its rigours, and others who will not be fit for battle when you are finished.’ He tapped his own leg pointedly with his crutch. ‘We will start with one hundred and twenty, that you may kill or cast out those who fail you.’
Qeran grunted, and Hamash, who had been watching the exchange, met his eyes. His lip curled slightly in disgust. ‘Even a crippled drillmaster should not allow a khaffit to speak so boldly to him.’
Qeran’s calm eyes revealed nothing of his intentions as his spear haft snapped upward, taking Hamash between the legs. The young drillmaster bent forward, and Qeran spun the weapon, cracking it hard against the side of his head, knocking him to the ground.
Hamash was quick to roll aside, but Qeran anticipated the move, slamming the metal butt of his spear down just as he rolled into the blow. Hamash’s cheek tore open as several of his teeth shattered. He coughed blood and shards, trying vainly to regain his feet, but the beating did not stop there. Qeran had firm footing, and struck again and again. Most of the blows were painful but not meant for lasting damage, but when the young drillmaster continued to resist, there was a sharp crack as Qeran’s spear butt broke his right arm at the elbow. He roared with pain.
‘Embrace the pain and be silent, fool!’ Qeran hissed. ‘Your men are watching!’ Indeed, drillmasters and kha’Sharum alike had stopped their training, watching with mouths hanging open.
Qeran turned to look at the other drillmasters. ‘Strip the men to their bidos and form squads for inspection!’ he roared, and they scrambled as if the command had come from the Deliverer himself. In moments their spears and shields were neatly stacked, robes folded, and the men stood at attention in nothing but their tan loincloths.
Qeran jabbed t
he butt of his spear into Hamash, still writhing on the ground. ‘On your feet and heel me. I will already have your tan veil. Fall behind or disrespect me again and I’ll have your blacks as well.’
Abban resisted the urge to smile as Hamash struggled to his feet, his face pale and bloody. He had chosen his drillmaster well.
Looking pale and dazed, blood running down his face, Hamash stumbled after as they limped over to the first squad. Another tan-veiled drillmaster stood at attention before them. His bow to Qeran was so low, his beard nearly touched the ground.
They walked the line, Qeran calling each man forth, treating them no differently than slaves on the auction block.
‘Flabby,’ Qeran noted of the first, pinching at his arm, ‘but a few months of gruel and carrying stones as he runs around the city walls would cure him of that. Perform the first sharukin.’ The man began to sweat, but he complied, moving slowly through the series of movements.
Qeran spat in the dust. ‘Pathetic, even for a khaffit.’
‘What was your profession before you answered the Deliverer’s call to sharak?’ Abban asked the man, taking out his ledger and pen.
‘I was a lamp maker,’ the man said.
Abban grunted. ‘Were you master or apprentice?’
‘Master,’ the man said. ‘My father owned our business, but left me to train my sons.’
‘What difference does this make?’ Qeran demanded, but Abban ignored him, asking several more questions before moving to the next in line. He was so thin his bones showed through his skin as he stood in his bido. His eyes squinted as they came to stand before him.
Abban held up three fingers. ‘How many?’
The man squinted harder. ‘Two.’ There was doubt in his voice.
Abban took several steps back, and the squinting stopped. ‘Three,’ the man said more decisively.
Qeran gave the spindly man a shove and he fell onto his back in the dirt.
‘On your feet, dog!’ one of the tan-veiled drillmasters shouted, whacking at him with a spear butt, and the man quickly got back in line.
‘This one does not even belong here, much less among the Deliverer’s elite,’ Qeran said.
Again Abban ignored him, still facing the man. ‘Can you read? Do sums on a bead lattice?’
The man nodded. ‘I can, when I have my lenses.’
They continued on thusly, Qeran pinching and prodding the men as Abban interrogated them. Some few were ordered to stand apart from the others, a group of potentials for Abban and Qeran to choose from.
They approached one who stood a head and more higher than all the others, his chest broad and his arms thick with muscle. Abban smiled.
‘You will not want that one,’ one of the drillmasters advised. ‘He is strong as a herd of camels, but he cannot hear the signal horns – or anything else for that matter.’
‘You were not asked,’ Abban said. ‘I remember this one. He was one of the first to answer the Deliverer’s call. What is his name?’
The drillmaster shrugged. ‘No one knows. We simply call him Earless.’
Abban made a few sharp gestures, and the giant left the line to stand with the other potentials.
There were over a thousand Kaji kha’Sharum in the capital. When the dama sang the curfew from the minarets, they had barely seen half of them. They culled from the potentials as they went, but still there were more than fifty men following them. Abban and Qeran took these into the pavilion, testing and interrogating them further until the group was narrowed to twenty, then ten, until at last they agreed upon four, including the deaf and mute giant.
Qeran argued against the giant. ‘A warrior who cannot hear the horns is a liability.’
‘In alagai’sharak, perhaps,’ Abban agreed, ‘but as the dama’ting have their tongueless eunuchs, I can make good use of a man who will never overhear anything he shouldn’t.’
They returned the next day after court, spending every moment until sundown inspecting, testing, questioning, and arguing until satisfied. Six times, Qeran threatened to quit if Abban overruled him on a particular man.
‘Go, then,’ Abban said over the seventh, a pit dog from Sandstone. He was a powerful brute, but his eyes were glassy with stupidity, and he could barely count his fingers. ‘I will not have idiot soldiers.’ The brute glared at Abban, but Earless towered behind him, arms crossed, and he thought better of speaking.
Qeran glared at him, but Abban glared right back. At last, the drillmaster shrugged. ‘Would that you had such steel when you were a boy, I could have made a man of you.’
Abban smiled and gave a slight bow. ‘It was always there, Drillmaster. Just not for battle.’
‘You have a good eye,’ Qeran offered grudgingly in the end, as he looked over his ten new recruits. ‘I can make warriors of these men.’
‘Good,’ Abban said. ‘Tomorrow we will go to the Majah khaffit’sharaj and begin again.’
It was another day to vet the Majah, a third for the Mehnding. It went more quickly after that, the tribes shrinking in size as they went down the line of pavilions in the training ground. The smallest was the Sharach with only three dozen full dal’Sharum and barely a hundred kha’Sharum.
‘We passed over hundreds of better men in the Kaji,’ Qeran noted after they had selected the best the Sharach had to offer. Like many of the older warriors, trained before Ahmann united the tribes, Qeran was fiercely loyal to his own and would prefer the majority of his recruits share his blood.
Abban nodded. ‘But the Sharach are masters of the alagai-catcher.’ Indeed, they had watched the Sharach warriors drilling with the weapons, long hollow spears with a hoop of woven steel jutting from the butt end to loop around the neck of a demon or man. A lever near the crosspiece could quickly widen or constrict the hoop. There were sharusahk forms to leverage the weapon, keeping control of the victim.
‘I can teach the weapon well enough,’ Qeran said.
‘Well enough is not good enough, Drillmaster,’ Abban said.
The drillmaster showed his teeth. ‘I taught the Deliverer himself to fight. That is not good enough?’
Abban was unimpressed. ‘You taught him much, but the dama taught him more, and it was blending the two that gave him true mastery. Ahmann studies the sharukin of all tribes now, and you will, too. You will teach these men, but you will also learn all they know. The Nanji spear and chain. The Krevakh ladder techniques. Everything. And if you are not up to the task, I will find one who is.’
‘I can learn the tricks of lesser tribes,’ Qeran growled.
‘Of course,’ Abban agreed. ‘And improve many of them, no doubt. I chose the greatest living drillmaster for a reason. You will make the least of these men more than a match for any kai’Sharum.’
Qeran seemed mollified by that. Sharum were such simple creatures. A bit of lash with a compliment at the end, and they were yours.
‘I cannot teach them the secrets of the dama that kai’Sharum learn,’ Qeran admitted.
Abban smiled. ‘Let me worry about that, Drillmaster.’
A wooden palisade had gone up around Abban’s compound by the time he and Qeran marched in the 120 kha’Sharum. The stakes were planted deeply and lashed tight to give no sign of what went on behind them, but they were carefully worn to look haphazard and weak. The wards along its length were strong, but painted with no artistry – nothing to draw attention to what might be going on behind.
It was, of course, an elaborate disguise. Once inside, Qeran gaped. Hundreds of chin slaves laboured to haul and mortar fine cut stone into the true wall – already waist-high – just inside the palisade. Others cleared rubble from the remains of the shoddy greenland homes that had previously populated the area. Great pavilions had been raised, some venting great plumes of smoke. The sounds of ringing metal, smashing stone, and shouting workers filled the compound.
‘You’re building a fortress,’ Qeran said.
‘A fortress from which we will arm and armour the forces of Sharak
Ka,’ Abban said. ‘A fortress that must be protected, especially now, when it is weakest.’
For perhaps the first time since Abban had come upon him in a drunken stupor, Qeran smiled, his trained eyes dancing along the palisade and the foundation of the inner wall. ‘Leave that to me. Your kha’Sharum will be patrolling in shifts by nightfall.’
‘That will do for now, but it will not be enough,’ Abban said. ‘My agents have purchased many slaves from the auction block, and their labours have made them hard, but they are not warriors. You must train them as well.’
‘I have never been comfortable with Shar’Dama Ka’s decision to arm the chin,’ Qeran said. ‘The Evejah tells us to disarm our enemies, not train them.’
‘Your comfort is irrelevant, Drillmaster,’ Abban said. ‘The Shar’Dama Ka has spoken. These are not enemies, they are slaves, and I do not mistreat them. They sleep in warmth with full bellies, many of them beside their own families, safe from predation.’
‘You are a fool to trust them,’ Qeran said.
Abban laughed in spite of himself, forced to stop walking and clutch his crutch for balance. He wiped a tear from his eye as he looked at Qeran, who scowled, unsure if he were the butt of the joke. ‘Trust?’ He chuckled again. ‘Drillmaster, I do not trust anyone.’
Qeran grunted at that, and they continued their tour. Abban led him to the armourer’s pavilion, where metal rang and the forges burned hot. Even with fanned vents along the walls, the air inside was stifling, thick with smoke, heat, and the steam of quenching troughs. Artisan stalls ran the length of the pavilion – forges of metal or glass, blacksmiths, grinders, woodworkers, fletchers, weavers, and warders.
Each stall was run by several women in the thick black robes of dal’ting, seemingly oblivious to the damp heat. Qeran, too, showed no sign of discomfort, though he had taken on the rhythmic breathing of a Sharum embracing pain.
Abban took a deep breath of the hot, foul air and let out a contented breath, as if tasting the finest tobacco from his hookah. It was the atmosphere of profit.
The Daylight War Page 32