Kingmaker

by Eric Zawadzki

CHAPTER 18

  The packs had come off as soon as their feet had stopped. Lujo muttered to Nolen while he massaged his shoulders. Blay spoke quietly with Jani. She shook her head but didn’t answer, leaning on her pack.

  Butu saw Zhek talking with Puro, though the lieutenant stared grimly at his platoon. The sergeant seemed annoyed.

  “Drink,” Blay urged her, and she did.

  She wouldn’t even be here if not for me, Butu thought. I didn’t want to get both of us killed by running away, so she gave up her birthright, and now we might both die anyway in the Kadrak’s war.

  “I’ll carry the tent,” he heard himself say.

  Jani fixed her eyes on his and seemed on the point of accepting his offer. She shook her head abruptly. “I don’t need your pity.”

  Butu looked away, flushing, not sure what to say that wouldn’t make this even worse. He drank from his canteen to give his hands something to do.

  “Jani, Butu is right,” Blay said softly but with an air of authority. “If you can’t keep up, the whole squad will be punished.”

  Jani turned her attention back to Blay. “Then I’ll keep up, sir,” she snapped, biting off the “sir.”

  “That goes for everyone in the squad,” Blay assured her. “Phedam, Nolen, Retus, how are you doing over there?”

  “I could stand to carry less weight,” Retus admitted.

  Blay made a gesture with his hands as if to say “see?”

  “Hey, mouse.”

  Butu growled in his throat and turned to look up at Tak. He’s stupider than Karp. The thought made him grin. Tak grinned right back.

  “Rarin here says you lift your knees too high.” Rarin’s dark look suggested he had not. Butu stared at Tak. “Use your hips, he says. Just let the knee swing forward.” He poked the chocolate-colored man, who glowered.

  “Yeah, what I said.”

  “Mouthe,” Chewlip said, “no hard feelingth, right? We all gotta fight together.”

  “Yeah.”

  Butu stared at them, feeling Tirud and Jani near him, and Blay not much farther away.

  “Yeah,” Butu said, holding out his hand. He took their hands, each in turn. “We’re all in the same platoon, with a water-starved camel turd for a lieutenant.”

  Their grins faded fast, and Butu looked over his shoulder at Zhek, fuming and grasping the hilt of his sword. Puro appeared next to him.

  “Drop and give me fifty, sordenu!” Puro hollered. Butu leapt to obey. “Shanubu, I’ve seen smarter piles of snakeskin, I have! Bright as the backside of a dead Nukata, are you? Mir desert you, sordenu, are you gonna take all day?” After a minute and twenty push-ups, he leaned in very close. “Watch your back, kid,” Puro said, not unkindly. “I won’t always be nearby.”

  Philbe called for the end of their break, and the company resumed its march.

  Butu felt much better — still sore, still chafing — but he worried less about Tak trampling him. Once or twice, when he lost track of his pace, he felt hands pushing him forward, and was grateful.

  We have to work together. One person can’t do this alone.

  Butu watched the captain and the lieutenants, especially Zhek, who spent more time near his platoon than the other, older leaders. Tak whispered to the taciturn Rarin that the kluntra’s son was overprotective, but Butu caught his sarcasm.

  Zhek made us lead the platoon on purpose. He wanted us to screw it up.

  Butu envied them on their horses but held immense admiration for the sergeants. They didn’t have mounts. Their packs were as large if not larger than the sordenu’s. And they didn’t flag or notice the weight. They moved around twice as far as anyone else, dropping back, swinging around, and shouting the entire time.

  They are men of stone — like golems sent to torment their charges instead of protecting them.

  They were still, technically, on the road, though it was more a wide, flat and very sandy path. The small rocks, pebbles and gravel of Gordney had already vanished. While the occasional green could still be seen, propped against some weathered outcropping, the desert mostly surrounded them.

  The captain called a halt for the midday meal, which was hardly enough time to rest, and then they marched again.

  “Not quite the shanjin, yet,” Tirud said quietly next to him, handing him a canteen.

  “I think I can see camels,” Butu replied, drinking.

  “Baggage train. We wouldn’t survive more than a few days out here without them.” Tirud hefted his pack. “We’ll camp somewhere with a water supply. The Ahjea know every well, oasis and cistern within a hundred miles of Jasper. How’re you holding up?”

  Butu tried to think. Arms and legs moving. Ground, moving. Pack, check. It’s lighter, somehow. Didn’t I take Jani’s tent? She’s to my left. He looked over his shoulder. Chewlip grinned at him, and it wasn’t ugly.

  Butu’s leg jerked spasmodically, and he walked. Puro began to chant again, and Butu answered it without thinking. Time slid by in a slow blur. It seemed the day would never end. He wasn’t tired or sore anymore. He was simply marching — keeping the line with Blay, Jani and the rest. Tirud complimented him. Butu was bored with marching, though, and wanted it to end, but it seemed it never would.

  Butu sensed some of the other sordenu stumbling and struggling to keep up. One of them might have been Jani, but if it was, she definitely was not alone. They paused for water, and many sordenu shuffled items so some packs were heavier than others. Tak and Rarin would hardly look at him, and Chewlip’s face was bitter. Butu heard himself offer to carry some of their equipment, but this only seemed to make them angrier.

  Zhek rode by, once, face dark. He bent to say something to Puro, who flushed and pointed at the captain.

  At last, Philbe gave orders to make camp for the night. Butu couldn’t see any source of water, but he could feel one deep underground. A squad dug open the covered cistern. A large part of the company dug trenches around the camp. The sordenu with tents pitched them in the gathering shadows of oncoming night.

  Butu walked around the camp, offering to help, but everyone ignored him. Then Blay was there, leading him to a cookfire where Tirud sat. Their tents lined up near it, and their packs lay on the ground there. One tent only had one pack by it.

  “Take off your pack,” Blay said, hand covering his mouth.

  “What?” Butu asked. Then, stunned, he felt over his shoulder.

  Shanubu! I offered to help all those sordenu when I’m in full kit! He groaned and stripped the pack off, letting it drop heavily to the ground. I hope nobody saw me.

  Tirud pressed something into his hands. “Drink.”

  Butu did, staring at the tin cup. His hand started to shake, and his legs, and he sat down then. Across the fire from him, Lujo, Nolen and Phedam gave him exhausted stares.

  “I’ll get you some food,” Tirud said. Then to someone else, “Blay, check on Retus.”

  There was a dry laugh. “He’s not the one I’m worried about.”

  Butu felt suddenly very alone. He could sense sordenu around him, but they seemed miles away.

  “You don’t belong here.” It took a moment for Butu to realize the voice was an external one instead of an internal one. It felt like Karp. “You used magic. Your whole damned squad used magic. We all seen you do it.”

  “I had no choice,” Butu murmured. His body had stopped shaking. Someone put a plate in his hands — stewed barley, carrots and meat, a biscuit to sop it up.

  “Shut up,” Tirud said.

  The snort was familiar, and angry. “Whatever you do, don’t let the Kadrak catch you. The Ahjea will punish you, but the Kadrak will kill you.”

  “Leave him be, Karp,” a new voice growled. It might have been Blay’s.

  “Look at them. This is why the clans signed the treaty — to prevent this from happening.”

  Butu ate mechanically. The food was warm and invigorating. The boots crunching around him, shifting the sand by the fire, were a tiny distraction from his focus of
the plate.

  “What’s really going on, Blay?” Karp asked quietly.

  “I have my orders. It’s an experiment.” Butu heard the strained tones Blay’s voice took when he didn’t want to explain something. “If it doesn’t work out, we’ll go back to the old way of training sordenu.”

  Karp sounds worried. That’s strange. Didn’t he see Zhek put us in that position?

  “Don’t feed me that load of camel chips!” Karp snarled, though he kept his voice low. “The rumors are true, aren’t they?”

  “Which rumors are those?” Blay asked with an innocent expression.

  Karp turned his back on Blay and walked away.