by K. J. Parker
"Fine," Valens said. "Walk back to Civitas Vadanis. But you're not going on the raid."
He went anyway. He stole a helmet, coat of plates, arm and leg harness from different tents during the night, and at dawn presented himself to the Vadani captain as the duke's special observer.
"First I've heard of it," the captain said.
"Maybe you weren't paying attention," Daurenja replied pleasantly. "If you like, we can go and wake the duke up and ask him to confirm."
The captain didn't think he wanted to do that. "Why's he sending you, though?" he asked. "You're that engineer."
"He wants a report on what's going to be involved in refortifying the station once you've taken it. I know about that sort of thing."
The captain shrugged. "Just do as you're told and don't get in the way," he said. "And if I want advice, I'll ask for it. All right?"
They followed the river as far as the Cure Doce border, then headed south, making good time over the top of the moorland ridge that ran parallel with the mountains. Strictly speaking they were trespassing, but if the Cure Doce wanted to make anything of it, that'd be fine too. Not surprisingly, they had no trouble. Valens had decided on the route himself, and though he hadn't shared his reasoning with the captain, the likeliest explanation was that he wanted the Mezentines to know they were coming. Why that should be desirable, the captain didn't want to speculate.
They arrived on the plateau above the station with half a day in hand, and the captain decided to use the time to rest the horses, since they'd been at grass for months and weren't yet back to full campaigning fitness. The Aram Chantat captains didn't agree; they were uneasy about the fact that the Cure Doce must have seen them coming and would undoubtedly have reported back to the Mezentines. Sitting about doing nothing for several hours would only give the enemy more time to react. The Vadani captain said that that was quite likely, but he had his orders. He was lying, but something about the Aram Chantat brought out the worst in him. "In fact," he added, "I think we'll spend the night here and attack first thing in the morning. I want the horses completely fresh."
"Unnecessary. Our horses don't need rest. We don't let them get fat like you do."
The captain smiled. "We'll wait till morning," he said.
He spent the afternoon watching the mountains behind and the road below. Four parties of riders, none of them more than a dozen strong, came and looked at them and went away again. He assumed they were Cure Doce-could the Mezentines even ride horses?-but he reckoned they couldn't see anything they wouldn't already have known. When it got dark he had something to eat, checked his armour by feel one last time for loose rivets and snagging joints, then went to sleep.
It was still dark when he was woken up, but he knew intuitively who was shaking his shoulder.
"What do you want?" he growled.
"Thought you might like to know." Daurenja sounded horribly cheerful. He smelt of blood. "There's a large force of infantry camped on the road from the City. Two thousand, maybe three; I've been counting campfires."
"Mezentines?" He reached up to disengage Daurenja's hand from his shoulder. It was sticky.
"Yes. Full infantry armour, and a field artillery train. Scorpions. My guess is, they'll try and lure you into a killing zone and shoot you up."
The captain propped himself up on one elbow. Very bad. An artillery ambush wasn't something he'd anticipated. "How long…?"
"I've just come from there," Daurenja replied. "Still three hours before daylight. I imagine they were planning to set up the pieces-well, round about now, actually, so as to be ready for a dawn attack. They'll be running a little late, though. I made a bit of a nuisance of myself while I was there, let the horses out, did what I promised my mother I wouldn't and played with fire. Oh, and I took the liberty of sending some men down to keep an eye on them. It'd be a good idea to know where they're planning to lure us, don't you think?"
An unpleasant thought occurred to the captain at that point. "The savages," he said. "Did you tell…?"
Daurenja laughed softly. "Sleeping like babies," he replied. "I thought it'd be a shame to wake them. So as far as they'll know, you figured all this out for yourself."
"I see." The captain didn't want to say it but he had no choice. "Thank you."
"No problem. I have trouble sleeping."
He started to straighten up, but the captain grabbed his arm. "What are you doing here?" he asked. "Really."
"Observing. You'd better get up now. You don't want to have to rush." "You're not supposed to be here," Valens said, looking up from a map on his knees.
The captain gave him a worried look. "I know, sir, but if I could…"
Valens nodded him into a chair. "That's all right," he said. "Nobody seems to do what I tell them any more, so don't worry about it. Congratulations, by the way."
"Thank you." The captain seemed more worried rather than less. "I know I was meant to stay behind with the garrison," he said nervously, "but in the circumstances, I thought I'd better report to you direct. I didn't want…"
"Quite." Valens smiled. "I was just about to write to you ordering you to get back here on the double, so you've saved me a job." The smile vanished like spit on hot iron. "What the hell happened?" he said. "That lunatic…"
"Did you send him with us?"
"Me? God, no. In fact, I expressly told him not to go."
The captain took a deep breath. "Just as well he disobeyed orders, then. If it hadn't been for him, we'd all be dead by now."
A look the captain couldn't read passed over Valens' face. "Is that right?" he said. "The report said-"
"With respect." The captain realised how loudly he'd said that, and cringed. "With respect, the report was for the Aram Chantat-well, in case they got hold of it. I don't know if it's procedure for them to see direct-level dispatches, but I didn't want to take the chance. So I came myself."
"Ah." Carefully, Valens rolled up the map and slid it into its brass tube. "So, what really happened?"
The captain shifted slightly. "We got there early," he said. "I thought it'd be a good idea to rest the horses overnight and attack at dawn." He looked down at the desk, then back up again. "May I ask a question?"
"If you like."
"You wanted them to know we were coming."
(He'd said it, then. And he was still alive, and not on his way to the guardhouse.)
"That's a statement, not a question."
"Yes, sir. You wanted them to have time to get ready, do something. Capturing the customs post was a minor objective."
"That's not a question either. But yes, that's right." Valens sighed faintly, as though knuckling down to a chore he'd hoped to avoid. "I wanted to get a taste of how the Mezentines are coping on their own, without mercenaries," he said. "For one thing, I wanted to test their reconnaissance and intelligence system. I wanted to see if they'd notice you and if they'd be able to send a message back to the City before you got there. Next, I wanted to see how they'd react. I guessed it was fifty-fifty whether they'd panic and assume you were the advance party for an attack on the City, or guess we were planning to cut the Lonazep road. Finally, I wanted some idea of how they fight. Cutting the road was important too, of course, but it wasn't uppermost in my mind, if you follow me."
A brief nod, as if to agree that the subject was now closed. "Well, sir," the captain said, "now you know. Either word got through fast enough for them to put together a pretty sophisticated response force, or else they're in constant readiness. They were there fairly quickly, and they had a good idea of what they were about." He paused, then went on: "If I'd done as the Aram Chantat wanted and gone straight in instead of resting the horses, we'd still have beaten them to it, though I'm not sure that'd have been a good thing, seeing as they had all that field artillery with them. It wouldn't have been much fun if we'd already been inside the station and they'd opened up on us with that lot. As it was, they came up during the night. Very professional job, getting a force that size so
close to us in the dark, plus they had the artillery train."
Valens nodded gravely. "Stupidest thing a soldier can do, underestimating the enemy. Hence my experiment."
The captain acknowledged that with a slight dip of his head. "We were that close to riding straight into it," he said. "There's a bend in the road half a mile or so short of the station from where we were. They were going to plant their scorpions about a hundred yards back-plenty of cover, but all loose stuff and rubbish, not the sort of thing that'd put you on notice. I assume they'd have sent a few sad-looking infantry up the road to meet us. They'd have run for it, we'd have followed up, straight into the scorpions' cone of fire. If they'd timed it right, they could've wiped us out."
Valens didn't say anything for a while. Then he reached for a jug and two cups, and poured them both a drink.
"Daurenja," he said.
The captain nodded. "Him," he said. "I still don't have a clue what he thought he was playing at. As far as I can make out, he either saw or heard them coming in the dark, watched them pitch camp; instead of coming back and telling me about it straight away, he snuck in there, stalked and killed at least half a dozen sentries, drove off the limber horses, set fire to a dozen or so tents, pulled the linchpins from eight or ten limbers, then just calmly strolled back and woke me up. And now you tell me he wasn't even supposed to be there."
"He's a character," Valens said quietly, after a pause. "So," he went on, "after that it was all fairly straightforward, I take it."
"Very much so." The captain lifted his cup, put it down without drinking. "We were able to come up behind the scorpions while they were still setting up-the Aram Chantat did a very good job there, makes me really glad they're on our side-while we had fun with the poor bloody Mezentines." He paused again. "I imagine some of them must've got away, but it can't have been many. Beautiful armour and kit they've got, mind, but it's like fighting a bunch of kids."
Valens put his cup down. "That's what I was expecting you'd say," he said. "The interesting thing is, they seem to be well aware of that, but they aren't letting it panic them. Hence the field artillery. Why send an untrained scared-to-death man where you can send a three-foot-long steel arrow?" He frowned. "Someone up there in the City's got a good head on his shoulders, and for once it looks like the politicians are prepared to listen instead of trying to score points. If it hadn't been for that freak…" He paused, as his frown deepened into a scowl. "… I'd have had to pay full market price for my lesson, instead of getting it cheap." He wriggled his back against the chair, which creaked dangerously. "I think we may yet have a war on our hands," he said. "I hope not, but from now on I'm assuming we're fighting grown-ups. For all I know, they've got the stuff out of books, but that doesn't really matter if the books are any good." Daurenja was saddling his horse when they came for him. They took the reins out of his hand and led him across the camp to one of the grain sheds, where a blacksmith was waiting with a small portable forge and anvil.
"What's going on?" Daurenja asked.
"Sit down on the floor," they told him.
As the blacksmith was riveting fetters round his ankles, he asked them again. "Your execution's scheduled for noon tomorrow," they replied. Then they left him in the dark.
Fifteen hours later, the shed door opened and Valens came in. Daurenja was sitting on the floor, exactly where he'd been. The chain they'd attached to his ankles had come from the silver mines, where it had been used to raise a seventy-ton ore skip from the bottom of a deep shaft. It was too heavy to move. Valens didn't need to look down to know that Daurenja's bowels and bladder had been active while he'd been sitting there.
"Had enough?" he said.
Daurenja's eyes were closed against the sudden bright light. "Yes," he said.
"Good. Don't do it again." He sighed, and perched on the rim of a flour barrel. "I've been trying to figure you out," he said. "Vaatzes came to see me, when he heard I'd ordered your execution. Basically, he talked me out of it. You should be grateful."
"I am," Daurenja said.
"I doubt that, but never mind. At any rate, I pride myself on only making bloody stupid mistakes once. I suggest you follow my example."
"I'll do my best."
Valens laughed. "You know," he said, "that could easily be construed as a threat. I'll say this for you, Daurenja, your best is very good indeed. You're very good at all sorts of things, so I understand. Vaatzes tells me you're a very fine engineer-he reckons you're better than him, only you don't know as much, not having had the Mezentine training. My cavalry captain tells me you're a first-class scout and definitely officer material, apart from this tiresome habit of not obeying orders. My wife told me how you fought off those Mezentines, on my wedding-day hunt. Saved her life, she says, and I believe her. You're a good falconer, too, by all accounts. Do you fence?"
"Yes."
"Play a musical instrument?"
"Six."
Valens nodded. "I envy you," he said. "I learnt the rebec and the violin, but I haven't played for years, never was any good at it; forced myself to be competent, when I was a kid, but I couldn't do it now to save my life. You're clearly what my father used to call an accomplished man."
"I had an expensive education," Daurenja said.
"I can believe it," Valens replied. "I believe every accomplishment you've gained has cost someone a great deal. It'd be a shame to waste all that trouble and expense, but I will if I have to. Do you believe me?"
Daurenja smiled, his eyes still closed. "Yes," he said. "Do you think you could get someone to take this chain off?"
"I expect I'll get round to it at some point," Valens replied. "If I had any choice in the matter, I'd leave you there for a week to think about what we've just been talking about, but I don't. Vaatzes wants you back at the engine factory. Oh, and there's a little job I want you to do for me before you go."
"Certainly. What can I…?"
Valens stood up. "Make me a chair," he said. "Something that folds up small for transport but doesn't wobble about when I sit on it. Can you do that?"
"Of course."
"Fine. I'll tell them to get that chain off you." He grinned. "You'll have to be quick about it, because Vaatzes wants you back on the road to Civitas Vadanis by nightfall. He reckons that if you ride through the night, you can be back at the factory in time to start the first shift after the lay-off. Won't leave you any time to get cleaned up or have anything to eat, I'm afraid. Still, you won't mind that, a rugged character like you."
He walked to the door, then stopped.
"I know why you did it," he said. "You wanted to show me how much I need you; not just at the factory, but everywhere. You wanted me to see what a brilliant soldier you can be. I imagine you're after a command of your own, once the fighting really starts. Yes?"
Daurenja nodded. "Yes," he said. "I want to lead the sappers when we attack the City."
"I thought you might say that." Valens nodded slowly. "Vaatzes told me how useful you were when he was sabotaging the silver mines. All right, then," he said crisply. "If that's what you want."
"Thank you."
Valens smiled. "Any time," he said.
He spent the rest of the day with the Aram Chantat. They weren't happy. They acknowledged that he had finally done as they'd asked and cut the City off from Lonazep, although he'd wasted far too much time; also, according to their captains, he'd sent the raiding party out under the command of an incompetent fool who nearly led them into a massacre, and it was fortunate that the excellent engineer whose name they couldn't quite pronounce had been there to save the day.
"Quite," Valens said. "I think very highly of Major Daurenja. In fact, I'm putting him in charge of the sappers, once the siege is under way."
They were delighted to hear that. They thought very highly of him too. Nevertheless, they were unhappy about the general conduct of the war, which they felt was proceeding without any sense of urgency or any real direction. Yes, thank you, they'd heard his exp
lanations before, and certainly they couldn't proceed until the siege engines were ready-it was a blessing that Major Daurenja was personally supervising the work, since they weren't at all happy with the Mezentine engineer Vaatzes-but surely more could have been done in the interim, by way of moving troops into position, preparing the ground, drawing out the enemy forces and so forth. They were disappointed, not just with Valens' actions but with his attitude. Sometimes they wondered if his heart was really in this war. Also, they felt compelled to mention, they disapproved of the haste with which he'd married the Eremian duke's widow. It was disrespectful to the memory of his dead wife, for whose sake they were fighting the war. He was, of course, at perfect liberty to remarry, as obviously the succession had to be provided for, but he should have waited until the City had fallen and the war was over. Indeed, under those circumstances, he might have had an incentive to progress matters at a rather more acceptable rate.
When he got back to his tent, the chair was waiting for him. It was beautiful. Daurenja had used a dense, honey-coloured wood that seemed to glow like amber in the lamplight (later he realised it was barrel-stave oak, salvaged from junked nail-barrels). The curved uprights reached up like two hands cupped to catch an apple falling from a tree, and in the middle of the back Daurenja had somehow found time to carve a fallow doe, frozen in the moment of surprise as she senses the approaching hounds, her head lifted and turned, her whole body tense and perfectly still.
6
Two horsemen. For a long time they were black dots on a green and brown background. Then they grew vestigial arms, legs and heads. The sun helped, flashing obligingly off steel, to show they were probably soldiers, though that was more or less inevitable, in context. The colour of their horses came next (one chestnut, one grey), and after that the pointed profile of their helmets, which meant that they were almost certainly Aram Chantat. At four hundred yards, the hypothesis was confirmed by the length of their coats, reaching almost to their ankles.
Today the hunt would be bow and stable. He didn't mind that. It suited the nature of the quarry. Parforce against dangerous game was all very well if you had twelve couple of hounds, a small army of beaters and a dozen huntsmen to ward the angles, but for one man on his own it simply wasn't practical. Jarnac would've agreed with him, if he'd been there.
