The Larion Senators e-3
Page 45
Gita gave the tired fisherman an uncharacteristic hug, then opened the windows, reaching on tiptoe to get the higher latch. She looked more like the partisans’ grandmother than their leader.
‘What happened, ma’am?’ Barrold picked up the chair, the map and what remained of Gita’s breakfast. He turned the body over with his foot. The woman was younger than Sharr, but not young. She was dressed as a maid, but it was impossible to know if she was merely a terrorist, sympathetic to Malakasian rule, or one of the occupation soldiers who had remained behind when the rest of them disappeared across the North Sea.
‘She brought a knife with my breakfast,’ Gita said calmly. ‘It was a mistake.’
‘A knife, ma’am?’ Markus asked. ‘Don’t they always bring a knife with your breakfast?’
‘I was having eggs and booacore.’
‘Well, you don’t need a knife for those things, ma’am,’ Stalwick broke in to state the obvious. ‘What needs cutting, really? I mean, what would you cut with a knife? It isn’t as though she brought you a loaf of old bread or anything.’
Sharr tested his legs and went to close the windows. ‘It’s cold.’
‘You all right?’ Gita asked.
‘Fine, fine.’ Sharr checked the street in either direction. ‘Just too rutting old for this business.’ The temperature had dropped again, and the sleet would freeze by the dinner aven, coating the town in ice. It would be a cold night for chainball.
‘Don’t talk to me about old, my friend.’ Gita smiled. ‘Anyway, if this one was Malakasian military, we have to be alert. Who knows what the others might be up to? How many did you say they had left?’ She ignored the body as she circled the table, shuffling through maps until she found one of Capehill.
‘There was a squad, maybe a handful more,’ Sharr said, ‘so fifteen, perhaps twenty soldiers.’
‘So we assume they’re in civilian clothes, hiding here somewhere amongst us.’ Gita bent over the map, her nose nearly touching the parchment.
‘That’s troublesome,’ Markus said.
‘And there’s no way to smoke them out,’ Barrold added.
‘Unless we round up the locals. You know them, Sharr. Pull two or three soldiers from each platoon, no more than ten from a company. Spread them out; blanket the town. See if anyone’s heard anything, seen anything. Find these motherwhoring pukes and bring me one of them alive.’
‘Very good, ma’am,’ Markus said.
‘And Sharr-’ Gita tugged her dagger loose from the treacherous maid’s chest with a grunt, ‘stay on your friend Hernesto. I want as much information as possible on the condition of the roads, the surrounding farms, the winter stores, the slaughterhouses, all of it.’ When he nodded agreement, she turned to Barrold and asked, ‘Any new additions overnight?’
‘Most of one platoon from the Central Plains, and almost a full company from Gorsk,’ he said.
‘Anyone from Rona?’
‘No, ma’am.’
‘Bloody Sallax.’ Gita frowned. And no word from Gilmour and the others either. When’s the Twinmoon, anyway?’
‘Maybe another day or two.’ Sharr checked again out the window, looking north.
‘We’re going to lose sleep over these leftover soldiers, boys. This isn’t good. Sharr, you’d better be right about Hernesto, because if he’s dirty, I’m going to eat his heart.’ Ignoring the map now, the grey-haired little woman prowled back and forth on bare feet, twirling her bloody dagger absentmindedly. ‘We have what… a thousand?’
‘Just over a thousand, ma’am,’ Barrold said.
‘Just over a thousand soldiers to feed, clothe and house this Twin-moon. I want to know that we’re hauling nets and booacore traps, that we’re running carts and wagons out to every farm with a storage cellar or a grain bin, that we’re contracting with every tailor, smith- rutters, even any schoolchild who can sharpen a blade or sew on a whoring button, understand?’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ they echoed in unison.
‘This corner of Eldarn is the closest thing we’ve had to freedom since before your great-grandmothers were in nappies – even yours, Sharr! – and I don’t want us making a bloody mess of it. If an armoured division is riding north along the Merchants’ Highway, I want to know. If a Malakasian sympathiser is putting chickenshit in the water supply, I want to know. If a local whore is selling information to a Malakasian spy, I want her gutted and served up with greenroot and pepperweed. I want every able-bodied farmer, merchant, sailor, fisherman, bartender, gutter-digger, fruit-picker and teacher armed and ready to defend this town, or to march on my orders. History will not recall that we had this opportunity and buggered it up; I don’t care how many knife-wielding scullery whores they send in here to stick holes in me.’ Gita stood toe-to-toe with Markus Fillin. She was a full head shorter than the Falkan farmer, but Sharr wouldn’t have wanted to bet on who would win in a bar fight, especially hand-to-hand.
‘Yes, ma’am,’ Markus said. Sharr nodded, and ushered Stalwick towards the door.
‘And find me these terrorists! Our hold on this town remains in jeopardy until we do.’
Markus saw the first fire before dawn.
Sharr was sleeping. They had been up much of the night, organising the search teams. By the middlenight aven, Markus had questioned hundreds of locals and dispatched pairs of their people to investigate nearly as many reports of suspicious strangers, unknown vagrants or potential terrorists. The people of Capehill either had no idea where twenty Malakasian warriors could have secreted themselves, or they knew exactly where to find the terrorists and were happy to lead Markus and his team to the hideouts. Naturally, each of these forays beneath the coastal town’s damp underbelly yielded nothing, and Markus, falling asleep on his feet, dismissed the search deployment for a few avens’ sleep.
But now he had the chance, Markus couldn’t sleep. He had met Sharr back at the boarding house – they had taken the room next to Gita’s, with Stalwick and Barrold in the chamber across the corridor. The big fisherman, exhausted after his heroic sprint across the town, had collapsed in his cloak and boots. He snored loudly for a few moments, then rolled onto his back, his mouth lolling open. Sharr owned an apartment near the waterfront; his wife and two sons were there, but he preferred to spend the night near Gita, on hand should another clandestine plot unfold before dawn.
Markus stirred the coals in their small fireplace, added a few bits of wood and some dried-out corn cobs Stalwick had hauled from the bin in the canning cellar, and warmed his hands. Someone shouted outside: a warning or a cry for help. Markus shuffled to the window, more out of curiosity than concern.
‘Who’s yelling at this aven?’ he asked of no one.
A shadow, dark and quick, hustled towards the town centre. Another followed. There was a second shout, louder this time, from the direction of Argile Street, the downtown business area.
‘What’s this?’ Markus whispered, his breath fogging the blurry pane.
Then he heard the cry again, this time from three or four streets over. Fire!
Someone moved in Gita’s room. There was a thud, some footsteps, and then the tired creak of her window hinges, complaining in the cold.
The first orange and yellow tendrils danced in the predawn haze. A plume of thin smoke rose above the merchant district, trailing in the light breeze.
‘What’s wrong?’ Sharr asked, without moving.
‘Nothing,’ Markus said. ‘Go back to sleep. One of the alehouses is on fire… I think. I’m not sure if it’s the Cask and Cork, the one we were in the other night, or the building right next door. It’s hard to see from this far away.’
‘Next door?’ Sharr sat up and rubbed his eyes. ‘Which side?’ He yawned.
‘Um, to the east,’ Markus said. The noise outside grew as more locals and a few of Gita’s Resistance soldiers hurried to fight the blaze.
‘East? That’s the fish market.’ Sharr poured a goblet of water from the bedside pitcher. He swallowed and said, ‘Tha
t’s odd.’
‘What’s odd?’
‘What’s to burn at the fish market?’
Markus shrugged. ‘Probably some drunk kicked a brazier over. You want to go help?’
‘No.’ Sharr fell back into the blankets. ‘The locals can handle it. We’ve got to be up and on our way before the-’
‘Wait,’ Markus said suddenly, ‘oh no, Sharr, this isn’t good!’
The first fire was joined by another as the old occupation barracks near the town livery went up in flames. The sound of horses whinnying wildly joined the cries for help as smoke billowed through one of the corrals. From the window, Markus watched as stable hands ran here and there, herding the animals to safety. Then another fire, still just a flicker of colour against the whitening dawn, glowed near the waterfront. It diffused into another and then another; flames burned rooftops across the town, making Capehill look like a monstrous pyre at a holiday festival.
‘That’s the harbourmaster’s office,’ Sharr said quietly. ‘And that- ’ he pointed south, ‘is an assay office. There’s a mining equipment shop, a glassworks, and a grain and feed store on that block.’
‘Whoring Pragans.’ Markus tallied the devastation as he looked across the false dawn rising over Capehill. ‘That’s six – no, seven fires we can see from here. What’s happening?’
‘It’s them.’ Sharr was up and on his way across to Stalwick’s room when Gita appeared, fully dressed, in the corridor.
‘You’ve seen outside?’ she said.
‘Yes,’ Sharr replied. ‘I want to look up north. There are more offices, some critical supply businesses there.’
‘I think we’ve answered any lingering question about the soldiers they left behind.’
‘Strike quickly. Burn what you can, and fade back into the populace,’ Markus summed up. ‘A cunning tactic.’
Before Sharr could knock, Barrold opened the door. He wasn’t wearing his eye-patch and Markus winced at the sight of the ragged, hollow socket.
‘There’s ten, maybe twelve fires burning out here.’ He didn’t seem surprised to find the rest of them gathered, fully dressed, in the hallway.
Sharr nodded. ‘It was probably all planned, or if it wasn’t, they decided to move after the attempt on Gita’s life failed.’
‘They’re using slow fuses, I’d bet,’ Barrold added, ‘rolled tobacco leaves will burn slowly before igniting whatever tinder they’re using. It gives them time to get away.’
‘On to the next target,’ Markus said. ‘We’ll be three streets behind them all day.’
Stalwick emerged from behind Barrold. Still groggy, he didn’t say anything.
‘Mother of an open-sored slut!’ Gita kicked at the wall, shouted an unintelligible curse, then regained her composure. ‘Stalwick, go get the others, all the company commanders, even the ones from Gorsk. I want them downstairs in the front room before my tecan gets cold. Sharr, you’ve got to think. What else will they hit? Come up with five or six likely places that aren’t in flames yet, and let’s dispatch platoons – no, squads – to those locations. Be ready to brief the others when they arrive. Stalwick?’
‘Yes, ma’am?’
‘What are you still doing here?’
‘Sorry, ma’am.’ Stalwick hurried for the stairs, tightening his cloak. ‘I’ll just… well, I’ll just go.’
Markus smirked. ‘Good show, Stalwick. Hurry back.’
‘They’re trying to hurt us from within,’ Sharr said. ‘They’re a handful of soldiers, not enough to fight us. So they’re attacking our food, horses, supplies, even the water won’t be safe.’
‘We need to catch one of these motherless bastards!’ Gita was fuming. ‘We’ll dunk him in the harbour until he talks, make him eat broken glass!’
‘I don’t understand why they abandoned the town,’ Barrold said. ‘Why give up Capehill, flee around the Gorsk Peninsula, and then leave a squad of spies to terrorise us? What do they have to gain by making our Twinmoon here miserable? Do they really think we’ll just sit around and starve, that we won’t boil water or buy grain on the Central Plain? Why are they doing this?’
‘I’ll tell you why,’ a strange voice said and someone clomped up the wooden staircase. He had the road-weary look of one who’d competed a forced march, and the soiled cloak and tattered boots to prove it. In the candlelight, his face was drawn and tired and angry. Markus knew he had seen this man before, but couldn’t place him until Gita jumped up and screamed in delight.
‘Brand! Thank the gods!’ She ran to the stranger and threw her arms around him.
Capehill burned all day, the flames reaching skyward as vast swathes of the city, both business and residential property, were reduced to ash. Resistance squads worked with local citizens to fight the fires, but the old wooden structures, many with thatched or wooden-shingled roofs, ignited and burned so quickly that little was salvaged. Sparks blew into neighbouring homes and whole blocks were quickly lost in a fiery haemorrhage.
By midday, it was impossible to know which burning buildings were the terrorists’ targets and which were collateral damage. The partisans gave up trying to predict what might burn next and directed their attention to saving what they could of the waterfront businesses, fishing boats and warehouses. Sharr ordered two apartments near the centre of the wharf torn down: the weatherbeaten wood would go up like tinder, putting the pier, the packing warehouse and the waterfront stables at risk. As the fires crept south, the burgeoning heat a harbinger of death, Sharr’s soldiers fixed lines to support beams and cross-braces, chopped through key trusses and, once everything was in place, on Sharr’s call, collapsed two two-storey buildings into splinter, which they then hauled away, leaving behind a breach for the fire slowly consuming the Capehill waterfront.
Sharr stole a moment to see his family safely onto his trawler, then sent them to a mooring buoy in the harbour until the conflagration was under control. His wife and sons wanted to stay and help, but Sharr had his way, arguing that they were doing their part by saving his boat, nets and traps.
By the dinner aven, most of the burning had been contained or left to consume itself. Capehill was a roadmap of hastily dug trenches and fire lines. Ponderous clouds of acrid smoke swirled over the harbour like a rogue storm. Three strangers, caught outside a textile shop, had been beaten and hanged by angry Falkans bent on revenge. With thirty-one dead, hundreds burned and nearly seventy homes and businesses lost, the people of Capehill found that their reputation for hospitality was wearing thin. No one knew if the three men dangling from a linden tree on what remained of the town green were actually Malakasians in disguise – it was too late to interrogate them – but their dangling bodies were a stark message to the Falkan leaders: life in Capehill has not improved. Gita and her Falkan Resistance soldiers would not be welcome much longer.
At the boarding house, Gita gave orders for half the companies to assist with damage control and clean-up, while the other half broke for an evening meal. They were to switch at the middlenight aven, and then resume their previous assignments, patrolling the town. The search for the Malakasians was broken off.
Sharr watched Gita climb the stairs. She had been dealt a damaging blow by a handful of Malakasians. She, like the rest of them, stank of smoke and burned pitch, and she had a blistering burn on one hand and a bloody gash across her forearm. She permitted Barrold to clean and bind her wounds while she prepared to address the officers. Sharr collapsed into a chair beside Markus; he was glad to see the young man had survived the day.
‘Lose anyone?’ Markus whispered.
‘No,’ Sharr said, ‘thank the gods. You?’
‘Two women from Orindale.’ He swept a greasy lock away from his face, then bound his hair with a piece of leather. ‘They insisted on going into one of the houses, said they heard someone yelling. I didn’t hear anything.’ He frowned. ‘The upper floor collapsed. I heard them scream once, but then there was nothing.’
‘Anyone else go inside?’
‘They should be thanking you.’ Sharr gave his friend’s wrist a reassuring squeeze. ‘You probably saved their lives.’
Markus, still despondent, didn’t answer.
Gita stood near the fireplace in the corner. She thanked Barrold, gave her wrist bandage a final inspection, then turned to those crowded into the room. ‘Markus,’ she started, ‘thank your people for me. I appreciate them securing this street.’ To the others, she explained, ‘Markus Fillin’s squads have been redeployed at either end of this block. We’ve had to move the sick and the injured from the building we’ve been using as a hospital to the upper floors of the chandler’s across the street. We now have- how many crammed in there, Barrold?’
‘Eighty-six, ma’am.’ Her personal guard had burns of his own, along both arms and on one side of his face, just below his eye-patch, but he seemed adept at ignoring pain.
‘Eighty-six injured today?’
‘There were twenty-two already down with illnesses or injuries, ma’am,’ he clarified. ‘We had sixty-four seriously injured today.’
‘And…’
‘And eight lost.’
‘Eight, gods rut a whore!’ Gita gripped the table with white knuckles. ‘And thirty-some-odd locals. Demonshit, that’s almost forty people, in one whoring day! Gods keep us!’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Barrold looked down at his boots. The rest of the room was silent.
After a moment, Gita leaned over the table and sifted through a collection of maps scattered across it. She found what she was searching for, then looked up again at her officers. ‘Thank you all… for today,’ she said quietly. ‘Thank you.’
A few of the officers mumbled, ‘Yes, ma’am.’ Sharr forced a smile.
‘All right.’ Gita almost visibly shrugged off her grief. ‘We’ve some information I want everyone to hear. Brand is back – he’s come from Wellham Ridge – and he’s been able to throw some light on why this irritating band of thugs was left behind when our Malakasian friends sailed off.’