The fellow on the right looked like a knight despite wearing no armor. He was a big man of middling years dressed simply in cloak and tunic but with tall riding boots and the hilt of a great sword visible over his shoulder. His hair was cut short but he had the long, brown beard of a native Orstavian, and his face was weathered by years out on the steppe, leaving his eyes in a permanent squint. His companion, judging by the shining boots, creased trousers, silk doublet and matching smart jacket, not to mention the silver chain of chunky links hanging from his neck, was none other than the Baron, Mediwether de Trellane. He was of an age with the knight, or perhaps a bit older as he had more gray at the temples of his dark hair. He wore a mustache waxed to points that Tilda supposed was intended to give him a dashing look, though to her it looked a bit silly.
The Captain halted his horse in the middle of the courtyard so Tilda stopped hers as well. Dugan moved quickly to help Block dismount before Tilda was out of her own saddle, then the two of them stayed with the horses while Block strode on to the nobles. Bows were exchanged, and the baron spoke the phrase, “ Bol Aloha,” the traditional greeting of the Trade Tongue.
The dwarf returned the greeting and introduced himself simply as Captain Block of Miilark. Trellane gave his own name and title, and introduced his companion as Sir Yeveny Procost of the Roaring Boar Order, which made Tilda raise an eyebrow until she realized he had not said Roaring Bore. Procost was the Imperial liaison to Trellane’s household guards, and the Baron emphasized Imperial as he said it, though as yet Tilda was unclear why. She did however notice that the knight seemed less interested in the barony’s exotic visitor from the Islands than he was in frowning at Dugan.
Eventually Block and the nobles entered the keep by the great doors, while Tilda and Dugan were first taken to the stables by servants wearing less militant versions of the griffin insignia on their clean tunics. Luggage was unloaded, the horses were seen to, and after a few servants ran off to talk to others, Tilda, Dugan, and all the bags were taken into the keep via a side door, up into a tower where three open rooms waited, and deposited in what were to be their quarters. Tilda had all the baggage placed for now in her own room, as the chamber was large and comfortably furnished. A pair of double doors paned with glass gave onto a balcony.
Dugan was given a room directly across the hall from Tilda. Before she could call him over and demand to know exactly what was going on a series of servants arrived, first bearing wash basins, then thankfully lunch which turned out to be an excellent stew of thinly-sliced potatoes, carrots and some sort of onion, with diced chunks of two kinds of poultry. Chicken and something that was not chicken, but was still good. The empty bowls were taken away shortly thereafter, and after another ten minutes had gone by without more servants appearing, Tilda finally whistled sharply across the hall. Dugan appeared in his doorway, still wearing his hat indoors over his cropped hair, and Tilda motioned him over. He came, but held up a finger before she could speak. He looked around at the walls hung with tapestries, then opened the balcony doors and stepped outside. Tilda joined him and he shut the doors behind her.
“I always assume someone is spying on me whenever I am in a castle,” he said.
“When have you ever been in a castle?” Tilda asked crossly, and Dugan nodded that she had a point.
“What is going on here?” Tilda finally asked after hours of waiting.
Dugan sighed, turned to the south, and pointed beyond the front range of the Girding Mountains. The whole view from the balcony was actually quite lovely, though Tilda was in no mood to enjoy it.
“You see the tall, yellowish peak?” Dugan asked. “With the high faces too sharp for snow to cling on them?”
“What am I, blind?” Tilda asked.
“That is Yagnorak. There used to be a dwarf city inside, but that has been in ruins for centuries. However, it is well known in this part of the country that the Trellane family has been keeping open a secret passage beneath the mountain for generations. A secret passage that leads through to Daul.”
Tilda stared at him. “There is known to be a secret passage?”
Dugan sighed. “That is exactly what your Master said.”
“Captain Block is not my Master,” Tilda said, surprising herself with her own vehemence. It did not help that Dugan smirked at her.
“Right. Anyway, your Captain is now telling the Baron that the House of Deskata has business with the King of Daul, and that he needs to get to the kingdom right away. The fact that he comes knowing about the passage will convince Trellane that he is legit, for who else but the King would have told a Miilarkian about it? Trellane gives us a guide, or whatever, and off we go through the tunnels, arriving in Daul that much closer to our boy, the Centurion.”
Dugan held his hands out from his sides and looked very proud of himself and his scheme. Tilda kept staring at him.
“That is the worst plan I have ever heard. Just awful.”
Dugan lowered his hands. “Block said that, too,” he muttered. Tilda was not finished.
“Seriously. You are starting with at least three premises that would all have to be true for the plan to work, and you don’t know that any of them are. First, there might not even be a secret passage. Second…”
“Matilda, stop. I know it is risky, but the fact is we do not have another option. If there was a better way, don’t you think I would take it? Think about it. Neither Trellane nor any other Codian noble is seriously going to cross a Miilarkian. If something goes wrong here the worst that happens to the two of you is maybe you have to wait a bit longer to kill John Deskata. But I get hung. For desertion and treason and whatever else they want to charge. I’ll thank you not to think I would stick my neck in a noose on a whim. I am not stupid, either.”
Tilda blinked, mostly because of what Dugan had said about she and Block killing John Deskata. It struck her now that of course that was what Dugan would assume, for he had recognized the Miilarkian Guilders for what they were, and Guilders had a certain reputation abroad. In any tavern in any port town on the four continents washed by the Interminable Ocean, whispered stories could be heard about some terrible thing the Guilders had done to someone who had crossed a Miilarkian. Yet somehow, it had always happened in the next town up the coast.
Tilda could have told Dugan that he was wrong, and that these two Guilders were not here to assassinate anyone. She could have told him that their mission was more important than he could fathom, more important than his life, or Captain Block’s, or certainly her own. But there was no reason for Dugan to know any of that, and even if there had been, it was not Tilda’s place to tell him.
She stayed quiet, and Dugan took her silence as acquiescence. He let out a breath, and looked down from the balcony on the surrounding keep and courtyard.
“You saw that knight Procost give me the stink-eye?” he asked. Tilda raised an eyebrow.
“I did, but I did not know it was called the stink-eye.”
Dugan smirked. “Works though, right? That is an Imperial Knight, swearing allegiance to the Code rather than to any one Codian noble. He may be serving here but he is not a servant of the Trellanes, and I doubt he is privy to the family secrets. I hope your Captain is speaking wisely.”
“Captain Block does not speak otherwise,” Tilda said, and Dugan gave her a look.
“Sure he does, Tilda. Everybody gets worried, or angry, and they say things they don’t mean.”
“Not Captain Block.”
Dugan took a last look down on the town, and toward the great yellow mountain looming among the Girdings. He turned to go back to his own room, but said one more thing before opening the balcony doors.
“Well, then he is just wrong.”
Tilda watched Dugan leave, exiting her room for the hall to his own. She stayed out on the balcony for a while.
*
There was still no sign of Captain Block at nightfall, though Tilda and Dugan were brought another meal, this one of pork loins roasted with nuts
and then glazed. Tilda agreed with Dugan’s assessment shouted across the hall that while the Dauls had not won a war in centuries, they still knew how to cook a pig.
Tilda occupied the evening hours by oiling blades, and then she cleaned all three of the ackserpi guns Block had brought along from Miilark. There was still no sign of the old dwarf, and the anxious waiting made Tilda tired. She lay down on top of the bed covers in her room, still in trousers and sweater but with her boots off, and despite everything running through her mind she soon drifted off to sleep.
Footsteps on the stairs woke her with the night sky still dark outside, and Tilda was against the wall beside her door with a dagger held behind her back by the time someone knocked. The Captain’s voice growled her name. She opened the door and found Block swaying on his feet, one eye open and one screwed shut, face waxy and a very long day’s worth of dark gray stubble on his cheeks.
“We’re leaving,” Block said, wincing in the low lantern light from the hall. “Get the bags.”
Servants, also looking groggy but at least sober, appeared on the stairs while Block lurched over to pound on Dugan’s door. Tilda dispersed the baggage among them, keeping the long, flat ackserpi case and the Captain’s kitbag for herself. Dugan came over in time to hoist the bedrolls along with his own saddlebags. Everyone followed the Captain down from the tower and back out into the courtyard. Block muttered at the eastern sky, faintly touched now with light over the courtyard wall, and weaved toward a six-horse coach waiting by the open gate. Tilda took a few rapid steps to draw even with him.
“What about our horses?” she asked.
“Sold ’em to the baron,” Block said with a slur. “Would have given them as a gift, but Trell…Trellane wanted to bargain with a Miilarkian.” The Captain chuckled and shook some coins together in a pocket.
Dugan had padded up on the dwarf’s other shoulder. “Have you been drinking this whole time?”
“A’course not. We stopped to eat once.”
Block drifted on under half-sail but Tilda had stopped and stood looking over at the dark stables. Dugan halted beside her and waited for the servants to pass.
“They’ll be fine here,” he said. “Better than fine. Hinterland Codians love their horses. Daulmen even more so.”
Tilda blinked at him and thought of the white warhorse by the tree, washed and bandaged as well as could be managed in the circumstances. Even by a man in a great hurry to be on his way.
“Thank you,” Tilda said. Dugan nodded and turned to go, but hitched a step as she added, “You are a kind man.”
Dugan looked back at Tilda and blinked, a strange expression on his face. She hurried past him and helped Captain Block lurch into the coach from a stool, while the servants secured the baggage in the boot.
The trip back through town was short, and though the driver up top was the only person to accompany them, Block answered none of the questions Tilda and Dugan tried to ask him. The dwarf rode far back in his cushioned seat, eyes closed and mouth open, swearing quietly whenever the coach bumped or jostled.
There was just enough daylight to see mist on the mountain slopes as the coach passed through an open gate in the south town wall without challenge, crossed the portage road, and swung around behind a dark inn that looked to be closed for the season. The driver parked behind a stable in a yard surrounded by a corral fence, and hopped down to help Tilda and Dugan unload. Captain Block took only his kitbag, leaving Tilda and Dugan to split all the baggage they had carried on two horses. Both bent under saddlebags, bedrolls, knapsacks and duffels. The dwarf hardly waited for them before opening a back gate and starting across a dewy meadow to the south, moving on a more-or-less straight line for a homely cottage under pine trees, beyond which the foothills immediately began to rise.
Tilda looked past the hills and up toward the mountains, which from her present position looked like an impenetrable wall. The narrow light of dawn threw sharp black shadows across their stony faces from every crag and overhang, and the forests on their lower slopes were mantled with mist off the river. Whatever form Dugan’s “secret passage” took, she hoped that it went through, and not over.
Block’s stride quickened as he moved around the derelict cottage, and a moment later Tilda lifted her head despite her bowed shoulders. She sniffed the air.
“Nine Gods,” she said. “Is that coffee? Not tea, I mean, but real, black coffee?”
“Doonish,” Dugan said from behind her. She glanced back and he grinned. “What, you think the Road Legions march on love of the Emperor alone? Why do you think we conquered Doon in the first place? Beans, my dear, not just a Channel port.”
Around the back of the cottage a camp was set in a semi-circle amphitheatre of pines. A half-dozen scruffy-looking fellows lazed about in dark leather armor, mostly around a fire pit with frying pans set out on stones. An old smoke-blackened carafe hung on a chain, wafting out the enticing aroma.
“Captain Block,” one of the figures called as he arose, and smoothly gave a bow. He had a light sword on his hip but wore no armor, only heavy clothing, polished boots, and a rich cloak. Though he was a good deal younger than the Baron Trellane whom Tilda had briefly seen yesterday, his face was similar enough that he must have been a near relative. Block squinted at him.
“Banner, was it?”
Banner de Trellane grinned. “Kind of you to remember, sir, for I left the table early to see to your arrangements. Though from what I gather, I could have returned at any point. Had the revelries not so recently concluded, I am sure my Uncle would be here to see you off himself. But I am afraid that as it stands I am the only male member of my family who finds himself ambulatory this morning.”
“Is that coffee?” Block growled.
“Ah, yes. While knowing your intent to leave us with unseemly haste, I yet took the liberty of having a small repast prepared. Enjoy it, if you please, for you’ll not get quite the same for the next several days.”
“Not to naysay your Lordliness, but we manage a’right on the Underway.”
Tilda did not see who spoke until a little man stepped out from behind Banner Trellane. She gave a start, thinking for a moment that she was looking at only the second dwarf that she had ever seen in her life.
But this was no dwarf. While only slightly shorter than the Captain, the figure now grinning at the new arrivals seemed significantly smaller, for in chest and limb he was nearer the proportions of a human than to those of the rough-hewn Mountain Folk. Whereas the Captain was heavy-featured and bronzed by the Island sun, the newcomer had a pallid complexion and an imperishably grizzled look, with a sandy beard roughly trimmed, and wide-open saucers for eyes colored a strange, almost amber hue. His nose was pronounced and nearly bulbous, tending toward a lighter pink shade than the rest of his face. He wore leather armor as did the other men present, though his was under something in the species of a great coat, all unfastened, which would hardly have reached Tilda’s knees but hung right to the small man’s ankles. He wore a metal-studded cap at a jaunty perch high above a wide forehead, revealing that he was mostly bald. His smile seemed half the size of his head, and he flashed it constantly. He was a Gnome, Tilda knew immediately, though she had never seen his like before. For once, though, tales and stories were proving true.
Banner Trellane introduced the gnome as Sergeant Fitzyear Coalmounderan (“Just Fitz, as you please!”), and from that moment on, no one else could slide a word into the conversation edgewise.
Baggage was dropped, fried eggs were heaped onto crisp toast, and wooden cups were filled with sugared coffee. The three new arrivals sat down by the fire, Fitz flittering about them all the while. Before her first few bites and sips Tilda had learned that Fitz’s people hailed from out Ostia way, her hair was ever so pretty now wasn’t it, sure a Dwarf had not trod the Underway in an Elf’s Age, and a dozen other things of greater or lesser importance. Captain Block scowled at the gnome’s prattle and his lowered eyes refused to follow the capering figure,
coat swishing around quick feet, but Tilda decided that she liked Fitz very much.
Fitz was in the process of introducing the five men constituting his squadron, or as he phrased it, “Me lovely, stout boyos,” when one of them leaped to his feet and cried, “Hold!” Cups and toast hit the ground as all present turned to find a figure at the edge of the cabin. Booted feet apart, long cloak thrown back from a steel breast plate shining dully in the shadows, and the great brush of a dense brown beard. Procost. The pommel of the large sword sheathed across his back was visible beside a pointed felt hat, and the Knight of the Roaring Boar Order’s dark eyes glowered, directly at Dugan.
Fitz and his men looked around at each other. Tilda looked to her Captain, who was darting his narrow eyes from the knight to the baron’s nephew, as though he suspected a trap or a ruse. Banner Trellane’s surprise certainly seemed genuine to Tilda as the young nobleman rose and sputtered.
“Sir, Sir Procost? What brings, what, what are you doing here?”
Only Dugan did not seem surprised. He had begun to drift backwards after standing and turned innocuously away, but he stopped as he realized the knight’s attention was riveted on him. Fastened as with a heated ingot. The two men’s eyes met and Tilda, standing close to Dugan, heard him sigh.
“Young Master Trellane,” Procost finally said, eyes never moving to the man he addressed. “Fancy meeting you here.”
“What, what…? What?”
“I am conducting rounds in accordance with my position here as Imperial military liaison. I really need not explain beyond that.”
“I…” Banner Trellane took a deep breath. “I understood that my Uncle had an errand for you. Out in some village…”
“It is done,“ Procost said. “Though I decided to ride back early rather than stay over the night.”
Block’s eyes were only slits, and Tilda could tell he was grinding his teeth by the thrust of his fuzzy chin. He had marked Procost’s look at Dugan and clearly did not like what it boded any more than did Tilda. It reminded her of the deadly attention shining in the cold eyes of a Miilarkian jungle adder, the kind that were brought aboard ships in port to clear them of rats.
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