Cold Fury: King's Convicts III

by Gail Z. Martin

  “I can’t tell you how uncomfortable I am being the guarantee of your good behavior,” Dawe replied with a sidelong glance at Piran.

  “Don’t worry,” Blaine said. “We both want out of here badly enough to tow the line. It’s only a few more weeks for Piran.” In reality, the colony was still under Prokief’s control since the commander was also the governor, but increased distance gave an illusion of freedom, and Blaine was wholeheartedly ready for the change.

  I’m surprised Prokief is sending Adkin and Twain,” Dawe said. “It’s likely that he hates them even more than he has it in for you and Piran.”

  “I thought of that, too.” Piran looked up from what he was doing. “I think Prokief’s up to something.”

  “How can anyone have possibly been more irritating than Piran?” Blaine asked, and Piran glared at him.

  “It’s different with them than it is with the two of you, I think,” Dawe said, hesitating as he figured out how to put his thoughts into words. “You and Piran challenge Prokief’s authority. You defy him just by refusing to break. And he knows others look up to you, which grates on him all the more.” He paused.

  “With Adkin and Twain, they’re the kind that attract bullies,” Dawe said finally. “They’re easy marks. And for a sadistic son of a bitch like Prokief and his guards, that’s like honey to flies.”

  “I’ve heard the wolves are worse than usual this season,” Ernest put in. He leaned against the wall, watching a group of men bet at dice. “Some of the soldiers were talking. The colonists are angry about the wolf attacks, and so the problem with the herring fleet just made things worse. They’re supposed to receive protection from Velant’s guards and gods know, they get enough grief from the guards and the warden-mages—they deserve what they’ve been promised.”

  “All of which is going to put Prokief in an even worse mood than usual,” Piran replied. “Lovely.”

  They were downstairs in the common area, permitted longer in the large, open room due to the lockdown. Though it was the middle of the afternoon, the long dark meant the sun was barely visible, and the room was dimly lit even with the help of the lanterns. The men talked in hushed voices, always mindful that guards and their spies were nearby.

  Blaine was edgy. After his near brush with death aboard the herring boats, he thought he might want to sleep for days. He had availed himself of the opportunity to sleep and heal, but found that two days was a long time to try to sleep even after all they had endured. His dreams had been dark, full of portents and warnings, none of which he could clearly make out. A veiled warning is as useless as no warning at all, he thought. Blaine was sure he would not rest easy until he had his Ticket of Leave safely in hand. The hunt worried him. Too many things could go wrong. I’m sure that’s what Prokief is counting on, Blaine thought.

  The barracks door slammed open in the wind, and three guards stepped inside. “Rowse! McFadden! And the rest of the wolf hunters. Come with me.”

  Blaine and the others rose to their feet, exchanging questioning glances with each other. “What’s going on?” Piran challenged, never one to leave well-enough alone.

  “You’re to get your provisions so you’re ready to leave first thing in the morning,” the lead guard replied. “Everything but your weapons—you’ll receive those after you’re outside the prison gates.”

  Blaine followed Piran and the others out of the barracks, hoping that provisions included warmer clothing than the standard issue for those who worked the mine or the farm. Blaine doubted his heavy wool cloak would be enough out on the wind-swept open land. Unless the wolf hunt is just a pretense, and Prokief means for us to die of exposure in the forest. Finishing off what he started on those damned herring boats.

  The guard led them toward the laundry building, usually off-limits to male prisoners because it was one of the areas reserved for female convicts. The women made all of the prison-issued clothing for the convicts while tailors made the uniforms for Prokief and his guards. Blaine hoped this meant they were going to get the heavy outerwear they needed to survive.

  The guards led them into a large room lined with tables. “Start on your left, move to your right,” the lead guard ordered. “Find a coat that fits you on the first table. Woolen shirts and heavy pants are on the second. Third table is socks, hats, gloves, scarves—you’ll need them where you’re going. Take care of what you get—they’ll be your colonist clothing if you come back from the hunt.”

  In two and a half years of hard labor, Blaine had received new clothing only twice. What he was currently wearing was ripped and threadbare, little protection against the bitter climate. The canvas overcoats and water gear they had worn aboard the herring boats had been borrowed. “Maybe Prokief means for us to survive, after all,” Jame murmured.

  “Or he wants to make sure it looks good if the king ever questions why so many of the convicts die before they leave,” Piran replied under his breath.

  “Quiet down!” the guard yelled. He gestured for Blaine and the others to begin to file along the tables. On each table, piles of clothing lay separated into rough sizes—large, medium, and small—and one or two guards stood watch to assure that no one took more than his share. The coats were tanned hide with the fur turned inward. Blaine was pleased to find a coat that fit his tall frame reasonably well. They moved to the next table, where they found homespun woolen shirts and pants, much warmer than his current clothing. The final table held hats and gloves pieced from the bits of hide and fur along with woolen scarves. Blaine searched among the gloves for a pair long enough to fit his hands and retrieved a pair from the pile.

  “I think you’ll find these will be a better fit,” the guard said, making eye contact with Blaine. That alone was curious, as was the guard’s intervention. Kestel’s got to have had something to do with this. I wonder what she’s up to?

  Blaine took the pair of gloves from the guard and put his hand in, finding a small bit of parchment in one of the finger sections. He gave no indication that anything was unusual and nodded to the guard. “These will do fine,” he said, still wondering how Kestel had managed to get the guard to do her bidding.

  She was a spy and an assassin—and a courtesan, he thought. I suspect she has her ways.

  Piran gave him a questioning glance as they headed back to the barracks with their provisions. Blaine gave a nod, confirming that Kestel had made contact. He waited until they were back in the barracks and the guards had locked them in before he pushed his hand back into the glove and withdrew the small rolled piece of paper.

  “1 bell” the paper read. “That’s it?” Piran asked, looking over his shoulder. “What does that mean?”

  “I suspect it means she’s going to get us a full message at first bells,” Blaine said quietly, rolling up the paper and slipping it back into the glove. “And I guess she means to find me.”

  Piran raised an eyebrow. “In a locked-down barracks? What is she, a blinkin’ ghost?”

  Blaine shrugged. “If the rumors are true, she was the best at what she did.”

  “Until she got caught,” Piran said. “Or she wouldn’t be here.”

  “Everyone makes mistakes,” Blaine replied. “Let’s see what she thinks is important enough to be worth the risk.”

  Although Blaine knew he would need his energy for the first day of the hunt, sleep did not come easily. He heard the camp bells toll midnight, and lay awake for a candlemark until he heard first bell. The barracks was quiet except for the snores and muttering of his barracks mates. Wind made the roof creak. He thought he heard a noise near the door, but just as he was about to move, a hand covered his mouth and strong arms shoved him back into place.

  “Don’t move. Just listen.” Kestel’s voice was barely audible, her lips next to his ear. Blaine could hardly make out her form in the near-darkness, and figured she had donned head-to-toe black for the occasion.

  “Prokief plays dirty. He really doesn’t want to let you and Piran go. He’s going to try to frame
you on this hunt to have an excuse to keep you in Velant.”

  “Why not just kill us, if he hates us so badly?” Blaine murmured.

  “I don’t know,” Kestel replied. “It’s odd. Maybe it’s something to do with Piran being a war hero before he was exiled. You’ve got to keep Piran in line on the hunt. If you don’t do something stupid out there, I’ve got a plan to make sure you get your Tickets. I’m making arrangements to trump Prokief’s hand. Trust me.”

  Blaine raised an eyebrow at that, but Kestel shook her head. “Not now. I’ll tell you later. Just don’t give Prokief anything to use against you.”

  “Anything else?” Blaine’s chances to connect with Kestel were extremely limited due to the prison’s strict separation of male and female convicts. It had taken all of their ingenuity over the last two years to make plans for after their release, stitched together from snippets of conversation and cryptic notes.

  “Keep your head down, keep Piran’s mouth shut, and we may all get out of here,” Kestel said. She heard a noise and glanced sharply over her shoulder. “Got to go.”

  Blaine looked in the direction of the sound, and when he turned back, Kestel was gone without a trace.

  Soldiers came to collect Blaine, Piran, and the other hunters at sixth bells. The long dark made morning and evening nearly indistinguishable, but rising in darkness never put Blaine in a good mood. They received their meager breakfast rations along with their packs for the journey, filled with enough provisions to tide them over until they could trap their own food on the trail. Blaine and the others marched out of the camp behind the soldiers, taking turns in teams of two pulling a sledge with their provisions and weapons.

  “Tell me again why we couldn’t have horses for this?” Piran growled, shouldering into the rope harness.

  “I guess they figure the wolves will smell the horses,” Blaine replied, taking his place next to Piran.

  “And you think they won’t smell us?” Piran asked, incredulous. “Mate, even after the dunking we got in the harbor, we’re all rank as day-old fish. The question isn’t ‘will the wolves smell us?’ The real question is whether they think we’re carrion.”

  They trudged forward, changing places with Carl and Jame after a candlemark, and then Blaine and Bickle took a turn, then Aiken and Twain. The forest was farther than it appeared, and a crust of icy snow covered the open stretch of land between the prison and the tree line.

  “I’d kill for a cup of fet right now,” Piran muttered. The black, bitter drink was in short supply for prisoners, though the guards seemed to have plenty to keep themselves alert, and enough ale or grog to relax after their duties.

  “I’ve heard the colonists get fet with the shipments from home,” Blaine replied as they trudged behind the wagon, out toward the forest at the edge of the darkened fields.

  “Here’s hoping they have some whiskey worth drinking, too,” Piran said wistfully. “I’m a tad dry after all this time.”

  Blaine suspected that Ifrem’s Crooked House was more likely to brew its own ale and distill its own spirits than have the bulky items shipped from Donderath, but after three years in Velant, Blaine doubted he would be particular.

  “I want proper sausages,” Carl said with a sigh. He and Jame had been butchers before they were caught stealing and sent to Velant. “Once we’re out of here, Jame and I are going to go work for the butcher in Bay-town, or start our own.”

  “There’s always work for carpenters,” Bickle said, referencing his former trade. “Houses to be built, barns to be raised—coffins to be assembled.”

  “Aren’t you cheery,” Piran grumbled.

  Bickle shrugged. “It’s true. The only man guaranteed steady work is the gravedigger.”

  “I plan to see if the cooper needs extra hands,” Twain said. “All those barrels going out with the herring fleet and back on the ships—someone’s got to build them. Might as well be me.” Twain was Piran’s height but not as muscular, with shaggy, light brown hair.

  “I was a cobbler,” Aiken said. “And the first thing I intend to do when I get out is make myself a decent pair of boots.” Aiken was stout and stocky, with a reddish beard and thinning, curly hair. Blaine remembered what Dawe had said, guessing about the reason for Prokief’s dislike of the two men. He could see what Dawe was talking about. Twain was soft-spoken, reluctant to make eye contact, and hung back from the others. Aiken was awkward, trying to joke with the others and not quite succeeding. Show weakness around Prokief and you’re fair game.

  “What about you, Piran?” Carl asked. “What are you planning to do once you’re out? There’s no soldiering to be done that the guards aren’t doing, and much as you’re suited to it, I can’t figure you can make enough from boxing to survive, even if you could find anyone dumb enough to fight you.”

  “I probably could,” Piran replied, refusing to take offense at his friend’s jibe. “But my nose has been rearranged enough, thank you. I figure there’s always work for something with a strong back.”

  “And a thick head,” Bickle joked. They chuckled despite the cold and dark. Bickle looked to Blaine. “How about you, Mick?”

  Blaine had asked himself that question ever since he got off the convict ship. As the son of a lesser noble, he’d had some experience working with horses and helping the workers bring crops in from the field. But where Dawe could do smithy work and Verran could play his music to earn coin, Blaine had no skills other than what he had picked up from the mine, farm and herring fleet as a prisoner.

  “I imagine I’ll figure something out,” Blaine replied. “Probably out doing whatever jobs need to be done, along with Piran.”

  They fell silent. The light from the torches on Velant’s walls was far behind them, and the dim moonlight revealed little of their path. The forest loomed in front of them, dark and impenetrable.

  “When are they going to give us our bleedin’ weapons?” Piran muttered. Blaine had shared the essence of Kestel’s message with his friend before the guards came, so Piran was on what for him counted as good behavior. Blaine understood his impatience to have a weapon in hand.

  “You don’t think it was all just a set-up, do you?” Carl said nervously. “Get us out here where no one can see, and kill us all?”

  Blaine dared not let them in on Kestel’s warning. Instead, he shrugged. “Maybe. But it seems like a lot of work for something Prokief could have done just as easily back at the prison.”

  Kestel had been certain Prokief was indeed laying a trap, and equally certain that Blaine and Piran were the intended victims. He’s had three years to kill Piran and nearly as long to do me in. If he hates us so much, why are we still alive? Kestel’s theory that Piran’s war record conveyed some immunity intrigued him, but every attempt to find out more about Piran’s time as a soldier was aptly deflected. Prokief was a law unto himself in Edgeland, and Blaine could think of no other reason he would stay his hand. Perhaps a benefactor, high up in the military, with enough clout to make Prokief restrain himself? Blaine wondered. He would likely never know, unless Kestel wormed the secret out of Piran.

  “We’ll camp here.” One of the guards, a thin man with a hawk-like nose, gestured for them to stop. The prisoners had dubbed him ‘Beak’. A second guard had the long face of a hunting dog, and was nicknamed ‘Hound’. ‘Flat-nose’ looked as if he had gone a few rounds too long in a boxing match. ‘Knacker’ was perpetually glum and quiet. Seven prisoners and four guards made up the wolf team to which Blaine and the others were assigned. Two other teams of equal size had veered off a while back, aiming for other wolves’ territories. Either there’s a big problem with wolves, or Prokief has a long list of people he wants rid of, Blaine thought.

  “You said you’d give us weapons once we got out of camp,” Piran spoke up. “Well—we’re out. And before we camp on the edge of a forest in wolf territory, we need our weapons.” The others moved to stand behind Piran.

  “There won’t be time to hand out weapons if the wo
lves attack in the middle of the night,” Blaine said. “You’re as likely to die as we are if that happens. We want out of here. No one’s going to do anything stupid.” He very carefully did not look at Piran.

  Beak was the lead guard. Hound and Knacker moved over to speak with him, casting glances now and again toward the prisoners. After a moment, Beak moved forward. “Line up, single file,” he ordered. “You get a blade and a crossbow with twenty quarrels. If you shoot an arrow, retrieve it. Misuse your weapons against us or your fellow prisoners, and you’ll go back to Velant in chains. Understood?”

  Blaine and the others grunted assent. They queued up, and the guards reluctantly passed out the weapons. The swords were likely discards from what the soldiers used to train. They did not look like they had been battle-ready in a long time, and while they had an edge and a point to them, Blaine would have given a lot for a whetstone to hone them if he was expected to carry one of the weapons into a fight for his life.

  The crossbows were equally hard-used. Piran had the most experience with such things, and he examined his bow and quarrels once they had returned to the fire. “What a bunch of trash!” Piran muttered, eyeing the swords with contempt.

  “I notice the blades and bows the soldiers have look newer and in better shape,” Jame said, with a nod in the directions of the guards’ fire.

  “The sight on the crossbow is crooked, the tension seems off, and the arrows are badly made,” Piran grumbled, not keen to be talked out of his annoyance so easily. “As for the swords—if you can call them that—the balance is off and we’ll beat the wolves to death with them before we slash anything with those dull things.”

  “Would you rather have sticks and rocks?” Blaine asked, giving Piran a glare to remind him of his promise to not cause problems.