The Last King's Amulet pof-1

by Chris Northern

  Having Gatren's horse in my face had put horses in general to the forefront of my mind, and when the parade broke up I asked Kerral if he had one.

  “Sheo loaned me one of his spares.”

  “Good, that's only three to find, then.”

  “Three?”

  “My slave will be traveling with the baggage so I have a spare for,” I gestured to my small command who followed me back toward the camp, “one of them.”

  Most of the main force was still in place, the first cohort of Orthand's army marching off and the rest waiting for a hundred paces' worth of space to open up before following. Some of the equestes had struck out as vanguard and scouts, even though we were in about as friendly territory as you could get. My charges had wandered back toward the camp, presumably on the premise that standing around for an hour or more wasn't something they cared to do. Neither did I, and there was the small matter of horses to consider. My charges surely were not planning to walk. I had a horse, and so did Sheo, and I now knew Kerral had one. That left four men of my command on foot, which I felt was just plain silly.

  “Can they all ride?”

  Kerral threw the question over his shoulder and got a few terse but disciplined replies before he turned back to me with the answer, “Pretty much, yes.”

  “Give the best rider my spare. I'll see about the rest.”

  With that I picked up my pace and fell in alongside the healer, Lentro.

  “How's your head?” He asked.

  “Not good,” I told him honestly enough. “Remind me not to do that again, would you?”

  He smiled. “Gladly.”

  “Do your people have three spare horses I could borrow?”

  He looked instantly suspicious. “Why?”

  I outlined the problem and he thought about it before gesturing vaguely toward the city and wondering aloud why I didn't send my slave to go and buy what I needed.

  “He doesn't have the money,” meaning that I didn't.

  “Sumto Merian Ichatha Cerulian,” reminding me of my position was a fairly polite rebuke, “if one of our mounts goes lame we'll need the replacements.”

  I wrinkled my brow in confusion. “You are healers..?”

  He sighed. “Yes, bone is bone and flesh is flesh but a man with a broken arm that I have healed generally doesn't have to put it under immediate and constant stress, whereas a horse, using all four legs and with a man on his back, would. Bone healed isn't perfect. The body still has to finish the process.”

  “Oh," I said. "I hadn't really thought about it.”

  “People don't.”

  He hadn't point blank refused, but as we walked on he didn't say any more and actually seemed in bad humor about the whole thing.

  “There is clearly more to your calling than I thought. Perhaps I should consider learning more on the subject.”

  “The College of healers requires payment. The rules are very strict. The penalties for breaking them harsh.”

  I gave it up as a bad job. No horses and no free training.

  Meran and the other slave were where we had left them but now everything was loaded onto a cart; two more held the gear of my charges, and horses had miraculously appeared. I needed three more. The indignity of having half my command walking was absolutely unbearable. Given a choice of two unbearable things, the least unbearable has to be done. I grabbed Meran and whispered to him fiercely for a moment, then ignored him as he jumped on my spare horse and pounded away as fast as he could, considering the press of men, mounts and wagons. Both Sheo and Kerral looked for a moment that they might ask but rightly judged by the look on my face that that would be a bad move if they wanted to stay on the right side of me. They merely exchanged glances and let the matter drop.

  My own horse was saddled and ready so I mounted and looked around from the higher vantage. The camp had become, in effect, the baggage train. There were damn few men here who were not slaves or freedmen servants. I could tell who was who by the hairstyles and clothing. It was obvious. It wasn't long before my charges started to get into the saddle without order, consultation or fuss. I gestured their way, addressing Kerral and Sheo but keeping my voice just loud enough so that all my men could hear. “Go with them. You four, come with me.” I didn't wait, but urged my horse forward trying to look like I had an important chore to take care of rather than not wanting to be seen waiting about with four men on foot while the rest of my command rode off and left us.

  Once free of the baggage train I dismounted and started fussing about the horse, checking her hooves unnecessarily and looking at her teeth. She put up with it. I figured I had at least an hour to kill, maybe two.

  “Sir?”

  I sighed. It was much earlier than I'd expected.

  “Waiting for horses,” I told him curtly, dropping her right foreleg and turning around to face them as I dusted off my hands.

  It was Pakat, a tall soldier of forty or so years. He seemed calm as ice and met my gaze steadily. His nose was flat and his eyes hard, face expressionless. He looked exactly the type I had expressly ordered Kerral to get for me. Hard as nails, experienced, lethal. Perfect.

  “Yes sir.” He put one fist to his chest in a salute as he said it, then dropped into parade rest.

  “Relax,” I told him.

  “Yes sir.” He didn't move a muscle that I saw.

  I sighed. It was going to be a long wait. Hell, I had nothing better to do and I knew it. “Pakat, isn't it? You a career soldier?”

  “Yes sir. Twenty four years, sir.”

  I glanced at the others who also stood at parade rest, though a couple of paces back from Pakat, making him their leader either by arrangement or pure instinct. Who knows how rankers sort these things out?

  In any case he didn't need me to ask. “All career men, sir. Not less than twenty years.”

  “Clients?”

  He shook his head slowly. “Paid men sir.”

  There was a big difference. A professional soldier could be in the clientele of one man and only go to war when their patron required them to do so. At other times they bimbled about the world guarding his interests in foreign lands, be they client kingdoms, conquered territories, border territories, whatever. In short they only saw action when it happened. Paid men joined a unit, initially when a new unit was recruited. They then stayed, were paid, and went to the war (why else would a unit be recruited?), but they, unlike a client, could leave any time not actually engaged in a war so long as they joined another unit. If refused permission to leave they could buy out of that unit by law. Any short-handed unit would take them. They saw more action than clients, had more experience, gained more booty. These four bastards probably had enough money to buy horses. Herds of damn horses. I carefully examined their gear. It was well worn, all of it. Well worn but of the highest quality, without being the gaudy stuff nobles tended to buy. They were each wearing a small estate's worth of equipment.

  “Kerral chose well,” I commented under my breath.

  “Good man, Kerral.”

  No sir on the end of that comment. Oh no.

  I felt like asking them if they had any spare gear but seriously bit my lip on that one. Father hadn't sent me a damn thing. Not that I could honestly blame him; I must have sold ten sets over the years, so why should he send another? Still, I admit to being a bit disappointed in him. After all, I was doing what he always wanted.

  “Yes, he is. Saved my life once.”

  Pakat didn't look surprised but his expression did relax just an iota. I guessed that he was relieved that Kerral thought my life was worth saving. Then I thought about it and decided that that was exactly it. These men were only following me because Kerral had asked them to do so and Pakat was a little relieved that Kerral thought I was worth it, worth enough to risk his life saving mine, not a fool, not someone who was going to put them in harm's way for stupid or trivial reasons. He didn't ask under what circumstances like anyone else would. For him it seemed enough that it was a fact. It occ
urred to me that these men would not consider having a casual chat with me, which left us standing around doing nothing while we waited. That just didn't seem right. Well, if in doubt, ask.

  “We are going to be waiting for a while. What would you normally do?”

  “Wait.” He said it as though waiting were an activity.

  Well, I would normally read a book and I had been reading Tetrin's Study of the Barbarian Peoples, which seemed pertinent, so I dug the book out of my saddlebag, turned to the chapter regarding the Alendi and started reading. There was not much to distinguish them from the Ensibi; about the same in numbers and culture. Their lands edged the foothills to the Urnalin Mountains. Behind them a hundred smaller tribes controlled the valleys and highlands, generally a few villages and one stronghold to their name. The passes through the mountains were controlled by somewhat stronger tribes who controlled trade from the north. To the east were the Orduli and to the west the Prashuli. Much of a muchness. The Alendi produced charcoal and smelted iron. That was bad. Meant they had a good supply of weapons and armor, probably. And spare money if they sold their goods to other tribes. And trade relations and maybe treaties with some of the hundreds of small tribes at their back. But they were small tribes, a few villages. Say fifty to a village and ten villages each just for convenience. Populations of five hundred giving ten professional fighting men each tribe. Ten times hundreds wasn't many. Okay. No sweat. Memory told me that the other side of the pass was wasteland, hundreds of miles of it but set in its center a place called Battling Plain which was hotly contested by the surrounding nomadic, semi-nomadic and settled tribes simply because it was a large and well watered fertile plain where the bulk of what rivers flowed out of the mountains to the south and west joined together and ran on to the sea. The area fell outside the scope of the work I was reading but it sounded from what I recalled that there was nothing there to fret about even if our enemies had allies there. There were wild tales of strange magics and so on but then, aren't there always? Having the only source of magic known to us made us slightly paranoid on the subject. Spirit magic, we knew about and didn't worry over. It was small scale stuff, the spirits of the dead molded by priests to perform single simple tasks when called. Other potential rivals made us uneasy. I put that aside and read on. The Alendi had a single mighty fortress called the Eyrie, large enough to hold the entire tribe and to which they had apparently withdrawn several times in defense against greater tribes that no longer existed. In part that was our doing. No one had had any inclination to take control of these areas, but battles fought in order to plunder material wealth and slaves had been numerous in this area for the last two centuries, chipping away at their numbers. To the east, I knew, there were more numerous tribes that might extend for a thousand miles for all I knew. These other tribes also played a part in keeping down the numbers of the Gerrian tribes by their own raiding activities. There was an extensive section on the Eyrie that I read through even though I wasn't that interested; this was, after all, a punitive expedition and not a war of conquest. March there, meet the enemy, hit them hard, grab some booty and go.

  My reading was interrupted by hoofbeats coming steadily closer. I closed the book with one finger marking my place and looked around. My men didn't seem to have moved an inch. From the direction of the city came three horses and three riders. Not what I was expecting. Two of them were women. Definitely not what I was expecting. As they came closer I recognized them as Orelia and Jocasta. The man with them was their brother Urik, all of the family Habrach, a family with a lineage not quite as ancient and august as mine. I had been betrothed to Orelia until her family decided I was a lost cause about five years ago. I put the book away and moved toward them, trailed by my own horse. I didn't see the point in mounting and I didn't want to hurry. I had guessed what was coming and wanted as long as possible to think about what to say in return. If I saw out some military time and returned, I guessed that the betrothal offer was on again. Well, did I want that? Damned if I knew but the best time to say forget it was sooner rather than later. The fact is, I like being single. Women consist of willing slaves or widows, neither of which expect any kind of commitment. Of course I could just put her off. After I had served a year we could discuss it. That, I decided, was the way to go.

  I hadn't been paying much attention to the expressions on their faces as I thought through my own situation but all of a sudden they were close and no one looked happy. They looked worried, and that just didn't fit with what I'd been thinking. Worried for me? No. No, that didn't fit and would be insulting besides. Orelia wouldn't ride out here to insult me by showing contempt for my military prowess, non-existent though it might be.

  As soon as they were close, Orelia pulled rein and slipped easily to the ground. She was definitely worried, not to mention cute and a very good horsewoman.

  “Orelia, what is it?”

  “Sumto, will you help me?”

  “Of course.” Ouch. Suckered.

  She took a step closer, almost close enough to touch. Her brother stiffened in his saddle and her sister came down off her own horse all in a rush. Overprotective, I thought, but honor can be a prickly thing amongst city nobles. I watched her expression change moment by moment, nervous, wary, worried.

  “Orelia. Just tell me.”

  “My betrothed is a prisoner of the barbarians,” she blurted.

  I blinked, something had flashed in my eye but I paid no attention to that. I was busy. I didn't know whether to sigh at the inevitability of it or swear aloud at the injustice. I'd already said I'd do it, whatever it was. Now I just needed to know if I was breaking him free or paying a ransom. I prayed briefly for the latter before I asked.

  “His name and status is known to them, and they have asked for something,” her expression went deep into fearful and her voice dropped to a whisper. There was a hint of shame in there as well.

  “They asked for something? Not money?”

  She shook her head. “Not money,” her sister said. “The head of the Ensibi King.”

  That's when I started swearing.

  7

  I was still swearing in my head an hour later when Meran got back from the city. I could tell it was him at once; two riders, each leading a string of horses. Meran and the drover, ten horses for us and one for the drover to ride back on. I mounted as soon as I saw them. The wait was nearly over but I was no longer that pleased about it. I had already thought it through and there was no way I could get out of trying to get her betrothed out of there. The ransom was un-payable. To kill and extract the head of an ally was not an option. If Orthand got a hint of it I would have made a powerful enemy. Getting caught doing it just didn't bear thinking about. Orthand was a wealthy man and not one to be trifled with. Worst case scenario, death. Best, exile. Lots of unpleasant options in between. Even if I was lucky enough to get away with the enmity of a powerful man there are a hundred ways he could make life unpleasant for me, and would as a matter of principle even if he didn't take the matter too seriously. Of course, that was assuming the chieftain's protectors didn't get carried away or mistakenly believe they could get away with killing me. None of that looked good.

  The army was out of sight and the baggage train was well on the move by the time Meran pulled up and my men took their mounts. I decided Meran had purchased good animals as I cast a jaded eye over them and judged their worth. Four extra sets of saddle and tack and I didn't suppose I could grudge him that. Let him have a horse to ride. Who knew? I might need him to ride messages. Relieved of his string of four horses, Meran took control of the other six and paused. I raised an eyebrow and he tapped his free hand to the saddlebags behind him. I gestured that he should keep the bags and he bowed in the saddle and headed for the baggage train. There was money in the saddlebags and I trusted him with it better than I trusted myself. I drank and gambled. I had actually decided to give both a rest for a year, but why leave myself open to temptation?

  So. Paying the ransom was out. T
hat left rescue. The bad part of that was who had him and where. The Alendi had him, of course. And they were keeping him at the Eyrie, their one serious stronghold. And I was on my own in this. No way my six men would follow me there even if I asked them.

  I looked back at the four men who were with me and assessed their riding skills, all were fair enough in the saddle and I didn't have to worry about them falling off.

  Before I kicked my mount into a canter I asked one question. “How far to the lands of the Ensibi?”

  Pakat considered for a moment. “About five hundred miles.”

  That would take about twenty-five days or so. Plenty of time to worry about the details.

  8

  Anyone who wants to know what it's like to ride five hundred miles can do it themselves. At the end of the first day I was shattered. I'm a good horseman but all day in the saddle was more than I was used to. Everything hurt. I dropped to the ground with a great deal less elegance than I had hoped. My lower body was locked in place and straightening my legs was an agony. I hung on to the saddle horn for a bit, but managed not to groan aloud as I straightened up as much as I could.

  It was a good two hours to sunset and the bulk of the army was busy building a fort around us. It was standard practice and good habit to do so, even though we were in friendly territory. Done for the same reason that we had scouts out in front, rear and to the sides of the army. It has only happened twice but the rivalry between patrons can lead to clashes within our own lands. It would be pretty embarrassing to run into an ambush within a hundred miles of the city.

  For a while I walked the horse to cool him down and stretch out the rigidity of my own muscles. There was no two ways here. I was going to war and I had to do what needed doing. Primarily get fit enough to survive any fighting I might have to do. I figured twenty-odd days in the saddle would shed a good deal of the fat I was carrying and tighten up most of the muscles that counted. Sometime after these muscles loosened up I would start the morning with calisthenics and upper body exercises. I was looking forward to it, or so I told myself. I passed the horse to one of the men as soon as I figured I didn't need to hold onto the bridle in order to walk.