by David Gunn
‘That’s his girlfriend,’ I say.
General Luc looks at me as if I’m mad. ‘What has that to do with it?’ he demands. Emptying a wine glass in a single gulp, he pulls a face.
‘You want me to stop the fight, sir?’
‘I want you to use your discretion.’
‘Never had any, sir.’
‘Is that a joke, Lieutenant?’ He stares at me. ‘I’m not a general who appreciates jokes from junior officers.’
‘I imagine not, sir. And it’s not a joke.’
Ignoring my reply, he holds his glass to one side. An orderly comes running so fast he almost falls as his boots skid on the grit beneath him. ‘Find me something drinkable,’ the Wolf demands.
The orderly wants to say it’s not possible. We’re in the middle of nowhere, for fuck’s sake, but he simply nods.
‘Well, Sven . . .?’ Colonel Vijay demands.
Neen and the trooper circle with sideways steps, like angry crabs, as they jab and feint. They’re testing each other’s defences. Can’t be long before one of them draws first blood, maybe even gets in the killing blow.
‘General Luc doesn’t approve of sergeants fighting privates.’
‘Then you’d better stop it, hadn’t you?’
This is more of an order than a question. But I’m not happy with anything that makes the Aux look as if we’re backing down.
‘Sven . . .’
‘I’m going, sir.’
Both men stop circling as I step between them. Six or seven men jeer. They’re all Wolf Brigade, which is just as well. I’d have the hide off any of mine who behaved like that.
‘Fight’s over,’ I say.
Neen steps back, and returns his knife to his belt. The Wolf Brigade trooper stares at me.
‘Your man not up to it . . . sir?’
‘My man was killing Silver Fist while you lot collected medals for guarding empty corridors in unused palaces.’
There, I’ve just managed to insult his whole brigade.
‘Lieutenant . . .’
General Luc is so angry, the glare he shoots at the trooper who started this is enough to have the man staring at his boots. Meanwhile, Neen still waits, stripped to the waist, with his jacket wrapped round his arm. You’d have to be blind to miss the scar on his ribs or the puckered mess of an old bullet wound over his hip.
‘You,’ the Wolf says firmly. ‘Stand down.’
He’s talking to Neen, but my sergeant isn’t the one holding a blade.
All the same, Neen unwraps the jacket from his arm, then salutes the general and returns to his original spot by the wall, where Iona now sits between Rachel and Shil.
‘Of course,’ General Luc says, ‘sergeants not fighting privates doesn’t mean privates can’t fight privates . . .’
He leaves his comment hanging.
‘Mine,’ Ajac says, scrambling to his feet.
*
Ajac’s big, but he has little real muscle and no scars. He’s also young enough for his chest to be almost hairless. Taking one look at him, the trooper laughs and Ajac’s face tightens.
If the Wolf Brigade trooper lives, I’ll buy him a beer for that.
Wrapping his arm the way he saw Neen do, Ajac pulls his knife and scowls at the man. He was angry on Iona’s behalf. Now he’s furious on his own. All he has to do is turn that into something useful.
‘Neen,’ I say. ‘How good is Ajac?’
My sergeant looks worried.
‘Five gold coins we win.’ My voice is loud enough to carry. Those simply wondering what is going on decide they might as well come over and find out.
The trooper looks unhappy at my confidence.
Ajac simply looks shocked. Probably the thought of my temper if he loses me the money I won in Farlight. A moment later, Sergeant Toro appears at my side. His general has taken my bet.
‘Have you got five in gold?’ Colonel Vijay asks.
‘Yes, sir.’
He looks surprised.
‘Go brief Ajac,’ I tell Neen.
‘Sir,’ he says. ‘I’m not sure that’s in the rules.’
‘What rules?’
Given his general is watching, it’s understandable the trooper goes for a five-second knockdown. Instead of starting to circle as he did facing Neen, he launches a strike.
One second he’s opposite, the next his blade slashes towards Ajac’s guts and his friends start cheering. Their cheer dies as Ajac jumps sideways and jabs wildly, his blade aimed at the trooper’s face.
Although he misses, their man still flinches. Ajac doesn’t notice, because he’s trying to find his balance, but Neen certainly does.
‘What orders did you give?’
‘Watch his eyes. Fight dirty. Get it over fast.’
Neen’s right about all three. Unfortunately, Ajac refuses to obey. At least, he refuses to obey the last two. He circles instead, blocking a couple of clumsy attacks, and just dodging a slash at his throat that looks slicker than the previous two blows, unless it’s simply lucky.
Iona watches slack-mouthed.
I’ll be having words with her about blind stupidity later. I imagine the others know that, even if she doesn’t.
‘Get it over with,’ Neen growls.
The Wolf Brigade trooper glances over and something tightens behind his eyes. He thinks Ajac is toying with him, that the blond boy plays a waiting game.
‘Another five gold coins on Ajac.’
I’m lucky. No one takes my bet.
But it does the job and the trooper’s next attack is so panicked that half his friends believe it’s a feint, until he follows through and leaves himself wide open.
‘Now,’ Neen orders.
Ajac steps back.
His blade should be in that man’s kidneys. And the man should be down, pissing the dregs of his life into the dirt. There is no excuse for the anguish on Ajac’s face, he’s not even injured.
That changes when Ajac’s opponent decides to go on the attack. Feinting in one direction, he juggles his blade from one hand to the other, and jabs. We all hear Ajac’s gasp of pain as blood starts running from his hip.
‘Sir . . .’ Shil stands beside me.
‘Not now, Shil.’
‘It’s about Ajac, sir.’
‘What about him?’ I ask quietly.
When the trooper swings his blade at Ajac’s throat, Ajac blocks, using his jacket-wrapped arm. From his whimper, he didn’t wrap it well enough.
‘Ajac hasn’t killed, sir.’
‘What?’
She nods towards the fight. ‘Iona doubts he’s done more than slaughter a goat. She says he’ll keep circling until he dies of blood loss or that man kills him.’
‘Get me Iona.’
‘Sir . . .’ Iona looks terrified.
Given how I feel about her that’s a sensible reaction. Ajac might make a good soldier five years down the line, if he lasts that long, which looks unlikely. Iona, I can count on one finger of one hand what she’s good for.
‘Do you and Ajac share a dialect?’
She looks at me blankly.
‘Do you share . . .’ A dozen Wolf Brigade stare as I raise my voice and Iona nods quickly. Telling me that yes, her tribe has its own dialect.
‘Good,’ I say. ‘Tell him if he loses I’m giving you to the trooper.’
Iona looks appalled.
Almost as appalled as Shil, who stands beside her.
‘Tell him it’s tradition. He wins, you go free. He loses, you belong to the Wolf Brigade. They don’t have female soldiers or medics. So I guess they’ll just have to find some other use for you.’
‘Sir . . .’
Shil shuts up when I glare at her.
Their trooper is looking more confident, his friends are looking happier and Ajac is obviously exhausted. His collection of wounds now includes a slash that reveals a glistening rack of ribs.
‘Tell him,’ I say.
Pushing her way to the front, Iona almost get
s Ajac killed by reaching out to touch his shoulder. As he turns, the Wolf Brigade trooper slashes, and only Iona’s scream shocks her cousin into ducking.
The Wolf Brigade jeer.
But it’s at their own man for screwing up his attack. There are some sizeable bets being carried here, and the few who went heavy on Ajac at the beginning are starting to look worried.
In reply, Ajac asks only one question.
I know it’s a question from the way Iona nods when she answers.
Looking at her, Ajac looks at me, then looks at his opponent and something changes in the boy’s face. The question is, has that change come too late to save him? Now’s when I discover whether I get a soldier or a corpse out of this fight.
Their man is stronger, uninjured and experienced.
But he’s also a braggart. A small step up from a coward. I guess every regiment has at least one.
‘Finish it,’ a friend of his shouts.
Unless it’s someone who simply has money riding on the fight.
‘Yeah,’ says Neen. ‘Finish it.’
As the trooper steps in, Ajac jabs hard for the man’s gut and almost lands his blow. Twisting aside, the trooper slashes at Ajac’s face, and stumbles as his anxiety and the fury of Ajac’s attack tip him off balance.
‘Do it,’ I order.
Ajac nods, draws back his arm.
He’s on the point of striking when one of the friends objects. Sidekicking the back of Ajac’s knee, he waits for our man to drop and then drives his boot into Ajac’s face.
‘Fuck this,’ Neen says.
‘Sergeant.’
Neen’s hand freezes at my tone. And I watch him make himself release his own knife. The Wolf watches also, from across the circle.
‘Sir . . .?’
‘Ajac’s fight.’
Spitting teeth, Ajac gets to his knees.
His face is pulped, and he’s having trouble breathing through the blood that must run down the back of his throat. His original opponent decides the result is a foregone conclusion. Wrapping his fingers into Ajac’s hair, he drags back his head and slashes.
Iona screams and the crowd gasp.
When the trooper steps back to take a bow, he thinks it’s over. It’s not, because Ajac caught the blow across his palm. As we watch, he jacks his knife sideways into the man’s leg.
‘Twist,’ Neen yells.
Ajac does, viciously.
And with the man frozen in agony, he rips free his blade and rams it into the trooper’s groin, twisting hard. The man screams like a castrated pig, falling as Ajac rips his knife free one final time and crawls up the man’s shuddering body to drive it into his throat.
A knife’s point beats edge every time.
The trooper dies within seconds and is buried by his oppos, who dig through rocky dirt to their own depth, then stand to attention in the blazing sun to say the soldier’s prayer for a man who lost them money and standing.
I make the Aux join in, Ajac included.
No one in the burial detail blames him for what happened. There isn’t a Wolf Brigade trooper who wouldn’t have done the same.
The real surprise is that Ajac can stand, function and say the prayer. He can do this because Sergeant Toro turned up with five gold coins from General Luc, and a wizened major who turned out to be the Wolf’s own doctor.
A very good one too.
Having sewn Ajac’s ribs, hand and hip, and bent the boy’s nose into shape, he staples it at the bridge, before washing the teeth we collect in milk, coating them with protein coagulant and pushing them back into Ajac’s gums.
Then he gives the boy three jabs of battlefield morphine and tells him not to pick any more fights for a few days.
As we ride out, the Wolf tells the innkeeper not to cut down the trooper who tripped Ajac until he is dead. General Luc is very clear about what will happen if this order is disobeyed.
He leaves the trooper crucified to the tavern door.
Chapter 44
WE MAKE CAMP THAT NIGHT IN THE PLACE WHERE LEONA, Anton and I first met Senator Cos, and I smoked a cigarillo with the Wolf’s sergeant.
Sergeant Toro is still around.
Who do you think just gave me another bottle of cane spirit?
Mary, the girl from the inn, takes one look at the convoy that rides into her village and decides she doesn’t know me.
‘Wise decision,’ the SIG says.
‘How do you—?’
‘Fight, flight or fuck.’ The gun sighs. ‘You’re pretty basic. I could run you through the body chemistry, biological triggers and neural responses. But I’d only end up explaining every other word.’
‘Biological what?’
‘Your brain went, pretty. Your dick went, again . . .’ The SIG stops, thinks. ‘Actually, it was the other way round.’ My gun hasn’t forgiven me using its holster to store alcohol, but can’t resist being snotty.
If Mary has any sense, and she has, she’ll keep her head down and her opinions to herself and wait for us to roll out of here tomorrow. Then she can come up with a better plan for escaping. One that doesn’t involve me.
‘You’ll be all right, Sven?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Good.’ Colonel Vijay tries to smile. ‘Earlier, when you asked . . . I appreciate your concern, Sven. And I know we’ll all be happier when this is over.’
That’s his own death he’s talking about.
‘Sir . . .’
He turns back, finds his smile. ‘Have a good evening, Sven. I’ll see you in the morning.’
As is the way in the wastes, the temperature plummets the moment the sun sinks behind the horizon. Iona asks why it’s so cold here when night in Farlight is hot and humid.
Taking this as an excuse to wrap his arm round her, my sergeant invents a theory to do with the city’s volcano trapping clouds. He does this between taking his turn at the cane spirit and cupping the underside of Iona’s breast when he thinks we won’t notice.
His sister opens her mouth to object.
And I interrupt her to talk the Aux through how things stand between the Wolf and Colonel Vijay. Although they hear about General Luc’s visit to Wildeside for the first time, it’s only when I mention Aptitude that Shil and Rachel start looking at each other.
The colonel dines with General Luc at the inn, while we sit round our fire, draining the bottle and watching sparks fly into a moonlit sky. The sparks should remind us of what happened last night, all those burning houses and looted shops, but they don’t. They simply look like sparks disappearing into the darkness.
Neen’s twenty, Iona’s eighteen.
They’ve been together less than six months.
Their lust is understandable, although Shil doesn’t look at it that way. She’s ten years older than her brother. Old enough to remember the dirt poor, Uplifted planet on which she was born, and the punishments the Enlightened inflicted on girls who let men get too close.
‘Neen,’ I say. ‘Check the perimeter.’
Scrambling to his feet, he disappears into the night.
I don’t mind members of the Aux fucking. Battle can take you like that. Actually, anything can take you like that. Battle, loneliness, alcohol, just the sheer bloody number of miles from home. But I’m not having it cause problems.
‘All quiet, sir.’
Neen has the sense to sit opposite Iona this time.
It should be all quiet. At least, quiet in the sense no one’s likely to attack. We’ve got five hundred Wolf Brigade camped around us. I’m more concerned with General Luc’s people listening in.
‘So the Wolf says he’s going to kill Colonel Vijay?’
Iona sounds puzzled.
‘He’ll do it too,’ Rachel says.
‘Then why doesn’t the colonel run away?’
A chorus tells Iona that the Death’s Head don’t run.
‘Escape then,’ she says. ‘Withdraw.’
You can tell she doesn’t know the difference.
>
‘Because,’ I say, ‘he’s given his surrender to General Luc. He would have to take it back. And then the general would know he was planning to escape.’
‘That’s stupid,’ Iona says.
Neen’s torn between agreeing and telling her why it isn’t true. He sees me watching and bites his lip. He still looks like a farm boy half a spiral from home. Pushing hair out of his eyes, he says, ‘The colonel’s high clan. They have their own rules.’
‘And those rules bind us?’
It’s the first sensible question I’ve heard Iona ask, ever.
The fact she’s Neen’s lover isn’t enough to earn her a place here. She travels with us because her safety was the price put on me by a tribal woman who nursed me back to life after I’d taken more damage than my body could handle.
Iona will never make a soldier.
She’s built for bars and bedrooms, children and gardens full of flowers. Some women are. So are some men. Iona never makes any secret of what she wants from life. What she hopes Neen will eventually give her.
All the same . . .
‘They bind the colonel,’ I say.
Something in my tone makes Shil glance my way.
Without a word, she clambers up and removes the cane-spirit bottle that has found its way into my hands again. What’s more, I let her. A few minutes later she reappears with a mug of coffee. It’s hot, bitter and black.
Chapter 45
EACH MILE TAKES COLONEL VIJAY CLOSER TO HIS DEATH. Although he knows this, he’s far too polite to make a fuss about the fact. Instead, he shrivels inside himself, becoming paler and more upright with every rut and pothole that vanishes under our wheels.
Makes me want to slap him.
We’ve been climbing all day, in serious heat, towards distant mountains. These aren’t the high plains that spread around us in a grey mess of gravel, broken walls and half-fossilized tree stumps, these are the wastes.
The high plains are beyond the pass.
Bocage, not wastes. These were orchards once.
When did I start thinking shit like that? Meeting Leona fucked with my head. Fucked with it far worse than killing her did. Even the SIG-37 knows it. My gun’s keeping quiet around me.
‘Why?’
‘To give you time.’
