Honor among thieves abt-3

by David Chandler

  “We could build siege engines,” she said. “I don’t have the tools or the skilled laborers here for proper mangonels or siege towers but I could probably build some simple trebuchets. Won’t bring down the wall, but we can make the people inside wish they could crawl up their own arseholes.”

  Morget nodded in interest. “Could they be rigged to throw balls of flaming pitch? We could burn those wooden hoardings off the walls.”

  “Now there you’re thinking, old son. Why, I know some recipes for-”

  At the flap of the tent, someone cleared his throat. Morget jumped up at once and grabbed his axe. It was the Great Chieftain, Morg himself, eavesdropping on them.

  “All good ideas,” Morg said. “It might come to that. But for now, I want you two to stop this talk.”

  “You don’t want us even thinking out loud?” Balint asked. “We weren’t planning anything for real yet.”

  “For now I want to try a more gentle option,” Morg told the dwarf.

  Morget’s eyes narrowed. “Great Chieftain. There are murmurings in the tents. They have been calling you Morg the Merciful again. It is my duty as your man to give you warning.”

  “And so you have. I give little credence to men who whisper. Those are men afraid to act. When they talk openly of revolt, tell me again,” Morg said. “Now, come with me, Mountainslayer. Ness has finally agreed to talk.”

  Father and son tramped through the mud of the barbarian camp. This had all been fields once, fertile fields full of waving grain. Now it was a great brown soup that sucked at their boots and threatened to swallow the camp entire.

  There was little of the romantic in the investment of a siege. Everywhere barbarians were bending their hands to construction work-building enormous bread ovens, constructing crude mantlets, fencing in paddocks for livestock. The vast majority of the horde languished in their sodden tents, however, getting drunk. They knew they might be here all winter and wanted to get started on warming themselves now.

  “Father,” Morget tried again as they wended their way through the randomly placed tents, “they say you’ve lost your fire. That you won’t fight-and if you won’t fight, they want someone else for Great Chieftain. Someone who will crush this place.”

  “If it comes to that, I say good luck to them. You’ve besieged how many cities, Mountainslayer? One? And it fell within a week. I’m very proud of that, my boy. But until you’ve sat outside a curtain wall for six months, getting fat and lazy but always wondering if today is the day, the day you have to try your iron against that of some desperate man who just wants to defend his children… well. Don’t try to teach your grandmother how to skin a deer.”

  They came to the end of the camp. A broad open space two hundred yards across separated the camp from the city wall-enough distance to make archers think twice before wasting arrows on potshots. Morgain and her riders were the only ones daring enough to enter that disputed zone. Now Morg led Morget into the yellowed grass and together they looked up at the wall.

  “That right there,” Morg said, “is what separates us from the westerners. They can build things like this wall. That’s where their strength lies.”

  “There’s none in their arms, we’ve proved that.” Morget laughed. “Great Chieftain, we have no need of walls! Tents are enough for your warriors.” Walls had always been the emblem of the great injustice that locked the clans away on the dry and harsh eastern steppes. The people of Skrae had pushed them first from their walled cities, then back beyond the Whitewall Mountains, where they’d been all but imprisoned until the day Cloudblade fell. In the stories the scolds told, walls were objects of hatred and derision. “Walls! I’d tear this one down with my own hands, if I had the time.”

  Morg sighed. “Look at it. Really look at it. Right now it looks like cowardice and frustration. But imagine, if you can, what it would be like to own that. To be able to stand behind it and never worry about enemies raiding your camp again.”

  It was impressive, Morget had to admit. Twenty-five feet of closely fitted stone, mortared together and then dressed to give protection to the mortar. No amount of strength-of-arms could penetrate that defense. They would have to find a way in through stealth, or engineering, or, as Morg seemed to want to try, promises. “They called down a few minutes ago,” he told his son. “They’re going to send someone to talk to us. Finally.”

  “Talk. They wish to talk,” Morget muttered.

  “Yes. If one wishes to offer terms of surrender, one must be able to speak,” Morg pointed out. “Oh, don’t get too excited. I doubt they’ll give in so easily. They’ll want concessions, and we’ll need to prove we bargain in good faith. But if we could take this city without losing a single berserker, I’d not balk at the price.”

  “There’s more glory in breaking our way in by force,” Morget pointed out.

  “Glory. Yes. Tell me, Mountainslayer-if we bring down that wall, what do we gain?” Morg asked.

  Morget hated it when his father asked him leading questions. It meant there was a lesson to be imparted. His face burned even as it was flecked with cold winter rain. “We could storm inside, slaughter the inhabitants, and take the city for our own.”

  “And hold it for how long? The Army of Free Men is sticking close. Right now they’re afraid to engage us, but what if we stole their city? Do you think they would hold back then?”

  “I would relish the chance to destroy them!”

  “Ah,” Morg said, “but would you get that chance? Once we were inside, we would become the besieged. We would be the defenders. And if the wall is damaged at the time the Burgrave arrives-if there is a massive hole in one side of our only protection-how will we defend ourselves? I want this place intact, Mountainslayer. I want it in the same condition I found it. Otherwise we gain nothing by taking it. I’ll remind you, it was your plan to come out here in the first place.”

  Morget seethed but said nothing. The whispering in the tents was growing louder every day. When it became open muttering, he would move.

  But not until then. Morget trusted his own arm. He trusted the steel of his axe. But he was wise enough to know that without the support of the clans, his own strength would not be enough to get him what he wanted.

  “Halloo!” Hurlind shouted again. “You in there! Come show us some sign you haven’t forgotten us. You’ll break our hearts! Halloo! Show yourselves or we’ll write songs about how craven you were. Do you want your children to hear songs like that? Do you want history to remember you as cowards?”

  Morg pointed upward. There was definitely movement atop the wall now. A man was coming forward. He wore a coat of plate that covered him head-to-toe in steel, and a great helm with a gilt cornucopia welded to its top. He seemed to have trouble walking, as if unaccustomed to wearing so much metal.

  The man bent forward at the wait, so he could look down over the side of the wall. Then he fussed with his helmet, as if trying to get a better view through its eyeslits. Morget heard him cursing, his voice hollow and echoing inside the helmet. Then the man of Ness shrugged off the great helm with a sigh of disgust, and for the first time Morget saw his face.

  “Malden?” he shouted upward.

  The little thief stared back down at him. “Morget? Fancy meeting you like this.”

  “Imagine my surprise, at being hailed by a thief,” Morget shouted back.

  “It’s Lord Mayor Malden now.”

  “They put you in charge?” Morget boomed out a violent laugh. “Malden! I must admit, it’s very good to see you up there! I was worried this place would be defended by an actual soldier!”

  “Is that some kind of jibe at my expense? I never could figure out your wit, Morget. But then, I never went looking for it with a magnifying glass. Look, what do you want? You-the other one-you’re Morg, right? The barbarian king?”

  “We don’t have kings,” Morg said, with the air of a man repeating words he had spoken a thousand times before. “The clans rule themselves. They call me their Great
Chieftain.”

  “Morg the Wise! Morg the conqueror of North Tyndale, Morg the Master of Helstrow, Morg, friend of dogs! Morg whose sword is not magical, but who needeth not such toys to-”

  Morg shut Hurlind up with a pointed glance.

  “So you’re the famous Malden?” the Great Chieftain asked when he had quiet again. “Well met, friend. Morget’s spoken often of you. He said you were instrumental in helping to bring down Cloudblade. Without you he might have stepped into a trap under the mountain and hurt his foot.”

  “Oh, now you’re just insulting me,” Malden said. “I’m ever so deeply offended.”

  Morg grinned. It looked like he found Malden entertaining. Morget had always found the little man annoying himself. Such a weakling. He’d never understood why Croy had chosen this rodent to carry an Ancient Blade.

  Morg bowed low to the thief. “Forgive my transgression. I’ve come to make you an offer.”

  “Please don’t be surprised when I tell you to go fuck yourself,” Malden called down. “But I’ll do you the honor of hearing the offer before I reject it.”

  Morg nodded happily. “All right, then! We all know each other. Perhaps we can talk like rational beings. Malden, you’re in trouble. I think you know that. If we have to take this city by force, my clans aren’t going to be polite about it. They’ll rape your women, cut ears off your men, and eat every animal they find inside your walls. That’s just their way.”

  “So I’ve heard,” Malden said. “That’s why I didn’t invite you in to break fast with me this morning.”

  Morg shrugged. “I won’t be able to stop them if it comes to that. I can’t tell them what to do, not in the heat of victory. What I can do is give you another option. You can open your gates now. You can march out with whatever you can carry on your backs. I’ll give my word that no citizen of Ness will come to any harm.”

  “I’ve heard about your word as well. Ulfram V trusted your word. Every man in Skrae knows your secret, Morg: you cheat. That’s the only way you can win.”

  “I won’t make this offer again,” Morg pointed out.

  “Good,” Malden said. “Then I won’t have to tell you to dine on my shit again. I’ve never enjoyed profanity.” With that, the thief disappeared from the battlements.

  Morg looked almost saddened that his offer had been rejected. Had he seriously believed the westerners would even consider it? No warrior could have borne the shame of just walking away from a battlefield. Of course, Malden was no warrior-Morget knew that from personal experience.

  The Great Chieftain turned and headed back into the camp, with Morget trailing after him. They headed directly for Morget’s tent, where Balint waited for them. Outside the tent Morg sighed deeply. He stared down at the frost-withered grass and seemed to be convincing himself of something. Morget left him to his thoughts, knowing he’d already pushed his father enough that day.

  After a while Morg nodded to himself and pushed his way into the tent. Morget followed close behind.

  “Nice chat with the locals?” Balint asked. “Did you achieve much?”

  The Great Chieftain sat down on a stool and bowed his head. “I must take this city, and soon,” he told the dwarf. She nodded, her eyes suddenly bright with excitement. “I want to keep the wall intact. I don’t want to set the place on fire with balls of burning pitch either.” He sighed deeply. “Other than that, I’m open to suggestions.”

  Chapter Eighty-Four

  “Get me out of this ridiculous stuff,” Malden growled, trying to yank the gauntlet off his left hand. It felt like some of his fingers would come off with it if he pulled too hard. Slag hurried forward with a screwdriver to help Malden out of the armor, but Cythera just stood back and laughed at him.

  Velmont couldn’t stop peeking over the wall. It was as if the Helstrovian thief had never seen a horde of barbarians before.

  In fact he hadn’t. Malden had given strict instructions that no one was allowed up on the walls without his permission. He’d said it was so no one would become a target for some sharp-eyed barbarian bowman, but really he just hadn’t wanted anyone to see what they were up against and lose heart.

  A piece of steel dug hard into his side. It felt like it drew blood. “Quicker, if you please,” Malden snarled.

  “You want it done fucking right, or you want me to take half your skin off?” Slag asked. When Malden had decided to actually hear what the barbarians had to say-it was that or listen to their scold shout himself mute-it was decided that he had to look like an actual knight. The problem had been that the Burgrave, when outfitting his Army of Free Men, already took every complete set of steel armor in Ness. The few pieces Slag was able to scrounge had been of different sizes, and some showed the signs of repeated and ill use. The Burgrave had left these pieces behind for good reason. Getting Malden into the armor was torture-getting it off would be worse.

  “You told him for certes,” Velmont said, in the voice of a man who has just seen a ghost. “You told him good. Did you e’en hear him, though, what he offered?”

  “To let us all walk out of here? It was an empty promise,” Malden said. Slag started disassembling the complicated pattern of rivets holding his breastplate together. Ignoring the constant pinching of his skin, Malden tried to focus on the Helstrovian. Velmont didn’t just look scared. He looked like he was about to soil himself. “Morg might have kept his word and let us walk out of the gate. He said nothing about what would happen to us afterward. Most likely he would have enthralled us all. Even if he meant to let us free, then what? We don’t have any food left to carry with us. We could starve out there in the fields, with no place to go. Alternatively we can stay here and starve where it’s warm.”

  “You could’ve asked for time to ponder,” Velmont said. “Bought us some breathin’ room, at the very least-” He shook his head and seemed to recover himself. “Sorry, boss. There’s just so many of ’em. I don’t like our chances, is all.”

  Malden could hardly disagree with that.

  Velmont came over to help Slag with the greaves, and soon Malden was naked on the battlements, freezing in the wind. Cythera draped a cloak around him and led him down to the level of the streets. As they made their way back toward the Lemon Garden, Velmont and Slag gave him reports on where they stood. The food shortage was the main topic of conversation. Even with strict rationing, the people of Ness would be without so much as a crumb in two weeks. Malden had already recruited a legion of oyster rakers and fisherman to try to drag food up out of the Skrait, but eight hundred years of cultivation had left the river a poor pantry. Short of food dropping from the heavens (or, slightly more likely given the city’s religious bent, flowing up from a crack in the earth, stinking of the pit), people were going to starve.

  “Galenius tells us that starvation is the most effective weapon in siegecraft, far more powerful than any catapult or ram,” Malden said, thinking out loud. He had learned this in one of his frequent sessions with Cutbill. The former guildmaster of thieves was reading to him from the Manual of Fortifications like a mother telling stories to her toddler to help him sleep. The contents of the book, however, had left Malden with more than one sleepless night. “The siege of Hollymede, four hundred years ago, lasted two and a half years. There were a hundred thousand men and women inside the city walls when the siege began, and only six thousand still alive when the gates were opened-and the invaders never fired an arrow or bloodied a sword. Of course, many of the deaths were the result of disease and thirst. We have plenty of small beer on hand, and if we have to we can drink water, but we’ll need to watch for outbreaks of plague. Velmont, make a note of that-I want a committee of the public health set up. Any sign of disease must be taken seriously. Report to me if anyone gets so much as a running nose.”

  “Mother and I can help with that, a little,” Cythera said. “Much of learning how to be a witch is the study of health and sickness.”

  Malden nodded appreciatively. “Slag-how many archers can
I muster right now? If the barbarians decide to scale the wall in the night, will we be able to repel them?”

  “Depends how serious they are, lad,” the dwarf admitted. “If they all came at once? Not a fucking chance. If it’s just a few we might be all right.”

  He turned to Cythera next. “Has Coruth been keeping an eye on the Burgrave and his free men? Galenius makes it sound like the only way to break a siege is with help from outside. We need them to move, and now.”

  Cythera sighed. “I wish I could tell you otherwise, but the truth is, Tarness is building a winter camp, thirty miles north of here. He’s staying close, but he shows no sign of moving to rescue us.”

  “The bastard!” Malden swore. “He’s getting revenge for what we did to Pritchard Hood, most like.”

  “Or,” Slag said carefully, “he simply knows he hasn’t got an arsehole’s chance of beating Morg, and he doesn’t want to lose everything just to make a demonstration.”

  Malden sighed. “All right. We’ve done what we can. Galenius is also quite clear on the fact that the most important skill a besieged general needs to learn is when to sleep. We might be here quite a while, and we all need to keep ourselves as rested and sharp as possible. I’ll see you two in the morning.”

  Velmont and Slag glanced at each other and shared a discreet smile.

  Malden shrugged it off. He didn’t care who knew that he and Cythera spent every night together now. He loved her-he’d always wanted the world to know that. He’d only kept it secret so long because he knew Croy would kill him if he ever found out.

  That seemed the least of his problems now.

  Cythera turned down the sheets of their bed upstairs at the Lemon Garden and warmed it with coals in a covered pan. Malden watched her in this simple domestic task and found his heart nearly broke. He’d never expected her to be a real wife to him. Not the way most men seemed to think of their spouses-as free labor they could exploit mercilessly, and beat if they ever complained. That was something he’d never wanted, and especially not from Cythera. He’d never thought she would cook for him either.