The Return of the Black Company

by Cook, Glen

  “How long do we have?”

  “I don’t know. I’m not sure what time it is now. Just get going.”

  “I’ll need water and food brought in. The water should be sweet.”

  “Go.”

  I went.

  59

  I came back to flesh every few minutes to report the whereabouts of those Company brothers I could locate. The Old Man sent warnings to those he could, telling them to get over to the division at the Shadowgate.

  Wagons were on the move soon, leaving Lady’s crude factories with stocks of bamboo her workers had been able to reload. The supply seemed woeful to me.

  I darted everywhere. When I thought it would not hurt I fluttered northward. Swarms of crows came and went from the ravine where Soulcatcher holed up. I skipped backward in time, watched the Old Man and, sure enough, I found a time when he whispered to those two huge crows of his and they promptly flapped off to gossip with the crazy sister. I could not get Smoke anywhere near her, of course, and anytime I pushed even a little I got that tickling she is the darkness sensation.

  I got a ghost of the same thing when I swarmed off to see what the Daughter of Night was doing, though Smoke showed no reluctance to move a little closer. The child was writing furiously, her little face contorted in pain. She was working on a different volume. This one she had only just begun.

  “Oh, shit!” She finished the first one already? Croaker needed to know that. We might be in deeper shit than I had thought.

  Where was the Book? I did not see it anywhere. I had better find out.

  I took a dive into the past.

  I found the Daughter of Night crying. I found Narayan Singh stunned by that. He had not seen that before and did not know how to comfort her, though he had had children of his own in another time, another world, before the Black Company came to Taglios.

  I pushed back farther, to discover the cause of this bizarre circumstance. I could think of a hundred unlikely candidates I expected to see cry before that grim midget broke down.

  It started when she and Singh returned to their apartment after having escaped it only a step ahead of Lady’s raiders. Though forewarned the child had been too busy writing to pay close attention and had waited almost too long.

  Their exit had been so hasty they had had to leave the Book behind.

  So, I thought, some lad from Lady’s gang realized it was important and decided to take it back to the boss. I would have suspected Swan or Blade had they been inside Overlook.

  I was surprised again when I did identify the culprit.

  Howler. The little snake managed to slither into those quarters while supposedly driving our men back, while Narayan and the girl were suffering the effects of a mild disorientation spell not fifty feet away. He made the Book vanish.

  The screaming wizard must have feared that he could be seen from afar because he pulled a bunch of stunts and used a handful of spells, over the next several hours, to make sure the Book got lost to everybody but himself.

  He left a blank book behind. It was a twin of the one he took.

  Curious. How did Howler know about the Book? I checked my memories against whatever Smoke could find fast. Yep. Neither the kid nor Singh mentioned it to anybody. Longshadow’s people did tell him that they had asked for writing stuff but the Shadowmaster had not passed that on to Howler.

  I knew about the Book. I had told Croaker about it. Howler had visited Soulcatcher. The Old Man communicated with Catcher.

  Could it be?

  If I got a chance to dream my way around there again I might try to find out.… Shit! I could see only what was happening right now.

  I ripped out of there, went back to my flesh. I was starving and thirsty when I came out.

  “About time,” One-Eye told me.

  I guzzled water. “Where’s Croaker?”

  “Out making sure everybody knows they need to keep their shelters buttoned up tight tonight. Trying to get those shadow-repellent candles out where we’re thin on bamboo poles.”

  “Oh.” I ate for a few minutes. My manners were not upper-class. Then I asked, “You got any idea what’s going on between the Captain and Soulcatcher?”

  “I didn’t know anything was.”

  I groaned, drank some more water. “You blind?”

  He shrugged. “What did I miss?”

  “Those two have been swapping information all along. That don’t sound that smart to me.”

  “You figure the Old Man ain’t smart enough to deal with her?”

  That was exactly what I figured. Soulcatcher was a slippery old fish when Croaker’s grandfather was wetting his diapers. “Me? Doubt the Captain in any way? How could I do such a thing?”

  “Not you. You’re a veritable worshipper of the cow flops he walks on. You got a reason to be in a panic? Soon as we get straightened out here I want to get back to my hole. I’ve got some suckers coming over for a game of tonk.”

  That was One-Eye. The world was coming to an end and his main interest was cheating somebody at cards. “Tell the boss Howler snatched the copy of the book his kid was writing. He left her a blank so she could start over.” I took a deep drink while One-Eye stared at me dumbly, waiting for me to explain what I meant. I told him, “He’ll understand.”

  “Everybody’s got to keep secrets from everybody else. So the only people who know what’s going on are their enemies.”

  I grunted as I turned back to Smoke. One-Eye had a point.

  * * *

  As we neared Lady I sensed Smoke’s she is the darkness emotion, not very strongly. He must have a thing about females in general since he seemed to respond the same to all of them.

  Lady had received word but she did not seem troubled. Longshadow loosing his pets had been a concern of hers for years. Her men were trained. What needed preparing was kept at a state of near readiness all the time. Her division might succumb but not through their own failings.

  That had been Lady’s way from the dawn of time.

  I yielded to temptation and sped off to the north. I told myself I wanted to see if I could find Goblin and Mogaba. It would be good to know how exposed they might be in the coming mess. But I wanted to go on, past there, a long way. All the way to the wellsprings of my heart.

  I might not get to see her again, ever. This might be the last night of my life.

  60

  Goblin was almost impossible to find despite there being crows wobbling all over above the south face of the Dandha Presh. His handiwork was obvious, though. Anywhere that the locals were insane enough to cooperate with Mogaba, Goblin’s band had pillaged and burned and made examples. Mogaba’s troops had done the same to everyone dim enough to cooperate with Goblin or any of our allies. From a strictly practical, aftermath sort of viewpoint it was impossible to tell who had provided which instructional display.

  The locals did not seem to care who was fighting whom, or why. They knew they did not see any good guys or bad guys anywhere. During the few minutes I took to dip around in time I saw several villages and manors attacked. The nearer the present the violence occurred the more likely its victims were to resist—whoever came calling.

  The forvalaka participated in some of Goblin’s night raids. Crows came and went when she did, but a few always did so even if the big cat was elsewhere.

  They visited Mogaba, too. Apparently. Longshadow had provided Mogaba with an arsenal of mystical objects capable of distracting a seeker like myself, of averting any other watching eye.

  But this was not getting me to what I wanted to see.

  I did take a moment to check in on Cordy Mather’s party. Old Cordwood was on the south side of the Dandha Presh now, moving slowly and moving at all only because the mountains remained incredibly inhospitable.

  Cordy did not have crow trouble. That I could see.

  I was startled, though, to discover that a flock of the little monsters had nested amongst the crags and crumbles of the exterior of the Palace at Trogo Taglios. Thoug
h that should not have amazed me so, on reflection. Events in the Palace would be of particular interest to Soulcatcher, who liked to push her nose deep into everybody’s business.

  I was too eager to visit the swamp to waste time rooting around in the Radisha’s secrets. She is the darkness. She was still holding a lot of meetings with priests and leading men. Our books remained hidden where we had left them.

  I was surprised that the Radisha was making no great effort to find Smoke anymore. I did not believe that she had forgotten him.

  But I wanted to travel on. Banh Do Trang should have had time to reach Sahra.

  Oh, he had. He had! For the sheer power of the self-tantalization I joined him late in his journey and followed him as he approached the Temple of Ghanghesha. Shortly before he reached the place he stepped off the trail, which was just a raised path meandering through swamp converted to rice paddy, and took time to adopt a disguise using materials he had brought along. A little more dirt, a change in the hang of his hair, the quick adoption of a raggedy orange robe, and he became a wandering mendicant of one of the Gunni cults. Their vows-of-poverty missionaries went everywhere. Even the Nyueng Bao tolerated them. Their holiness was beyond question, however mad they might be as individuals.

  I have always found the religious tolerance of the southerners amazing and disconcerting, though it was really only an ancient habit predicated on the fact that no religious community was strong enough to show the rest the errors in their thinking at swordspoint.

  Trang continued on his way. He did the mendicant part very well. I think he may have played it before, maybe while first visiting Taglios. Nyueng Bao were not welcomed warmly there. They were too arrogant a minority.

  No matter. Trang was admitted to the temple. The older priests seemed to know the character he pretended to be.

  Trang did not approach Sahra immediately. In fact, he waited till evening before contriving to stumble into her. They had encountered one another several times during the day. Sahra had not recognized him.

  He made his apologies in softly whispered Taglian while Sahra was still too rattled by the collision to give herself away by jumping.

  I did not hear what Trang said. I did see Sahra’s eyes focus and fill with surprised life. She accepted his profuse apologies and went her way.

  That night she left the door to her cubicle unlatched. She indulged in the extravagance of leaving her candle burning.

  Trang arrived very late, when the only priests still awake were the three making the regular midnight offering to Ghanghesha in hopes of inspiring the god to grant the world another complete daily cycle free from calamity and despair.

  Trang scratched at the door to Sahra’s cell. It was a crude wicker thing that would not have thwarted a determined woodchuck. More a symbol of the thing than the thing itself, really. A rag curtain hung behind it, containing the light. Sahra let Trang inside, gestured him to a seat upon her mat. The old man sat, taking his due. He looked up at Sahra with liquid eyes. I knew he understood the substance of the message he carried even though he was far too honorable a man to have read it.

  In that instant I nearly panicked. I had tried some to teach Sarie to read but she had not picked up much. How would she be able to…? She would ask Trang, of course. And then I would find out just how good a friend the old man was. If his secret self sided with Uncle Doj …

  Sahra’s manners were perfection, which maddened me. Even though she could not serve tea or indulge in any of the other ceremonial delays Nyueng Bao use to avoid getting to the point, she managed to delay the crisis of the visit for fifteen minutes.

  “I have a message,” Trang said at last, in a whisper that could not have been heard by someone listening outside the door, even had that eavesdropper spoken Taglian. “It was delivered into my hand by a Stone Soldier who carried it north all the way from the last stronghold of the Shadowmasters. He insisted that it be delivered to you. Here.”

  Sahra lowered herself to her knees before him. It was difficult for her. She was getting big. She met his eye, frowning slightly. She did not speak. I do not think she trusted herself to open her mouth.

  “The Soldier of Darkness knew where you were. He knew what name you were using. This when I myself did not suspect that you had survived the tooga. Your family are cunning in their cruelty.”

  Sahra nodded. Still she did not trust herself to speak.

  Gods, she was beautiful!

  “They knew from half a world away, child. This frightens me. These are terrible times and terrible people walk among us. Some of them we cannot recognize. The Bone Warriors appear no more frightful than any others, yet—”

  “A message, Uncle?” She used that word as an honorific. Trang was not related in any way.

  “Yes. I’m sorry. I grow so frightened whenever I spend too much time thinking.”

  Sahra took my letter, stared at it a moment, reluctant to find out what was inside. But she was happy, too, I could see. Her husband’s brotherhood knew and cared. “Who brought this?”

  “He did not give a name. He is very young. He is Jaicuri. Vehdna. Low caste.”

  “He has a scar that makes his left eyelid droop so when you see him from that side it looks like he’s having trouble staying awake?”

  “Indeed. You know him?”

  “I remember him.” She turned my letter over again.

  “Do it, child.”

  “I’m scared.”

  “Fear is the mind-killer.”

  Damn! All of a sudden he sounded like Uncle Doj back when he was giving me fencing and fighting lessons. Was old Trang another one of these secret priests?

  Sahra opened the message. She stared down at what I had written, in big, careful, clear characters. Finally, she said, “Read it for me, please, Uncle.”

  Trang stuck a little finger into his left ear and dug around amongst the tufts. That old man had more hair there than on top of his head. He scanned my message, which he held in his other hand. He took a while to digest and think. Then he looked up at Sahra. He opened his mouth to speak, suffered a thought, looked around as though startled.

  It had occurred to him that it was, apparently, somehow, possible for us to see what was happening inside the temple of Ghanghesha. It had occurred to him that this was a moment that would interest us very much. Particularly a Soldier of Darkness name of Murgen.

  “It purports to be a letter from your husband.” He hesitated just a fraction of a heartbeat as he decided to leave out the adjective “foreign.”

  “It is. I know his hand. What does it say?”

  “It says he isn’t dead. That they told him you were dead. That he knows where you are and what your circumstances are because a great magic has been made available to him. That he will come to you as soon as the Shadowmaster is crushed.”

  That was actually pretty close to what I had written.

  Sahra started to cry.

  Sahra? I wanted to hold her. She was always the strong one. The disasters that overtook her could not break her. Always she soldiered on. No tears for Sahra, ever.

  I did not like seeing her emotionally distressed.

  I drifted nearer Trang. He shuddered, looked around. “That’s not all he said. He said he loves you and he hopes you’ll forgive him for the failure that let this happen.”

  Sahra stifled her tears. She nodded. “I know he loves me. The question is, why do the gods hate me? I’ve done nothing to harm them.”

  “The gods don’t think the way we do. They scheme schemes in which a life is only a flicker, just a second in a century. They do not ask us if we want to participate, perhaps as an alternative to happiness. They use us as we use the beasts of forest, swamp and field. We’re the clay they sculpt.”

  “Uncle Trang, I don’t need a homily. I need my husband. And I need to be free of the machinations of old men.…” Sahra started. She gestured, indicating that someone was outside, that Trang should be quiet.

  I drifted out of Sahra’s cell.
/>   A priest stood a step away from her door, poised in uncertainty. He must have heard something as he was passing. He glanced both ways along the unlighted hall, down at his own small lamp, then moved to Sahra’s door and cocked an ear.

  I swooped in close, poured all my anger into my will and tried to butt heads with him.

  He spun around. He started to shake. He hurried away. I could scare more than birds if I got mad enough.

  I went back inside. Sahra wanted Trang to send a reply. Her speaking the words were all the reply I needed although I would look forward to the note as a physical confirmation of our eternal connection, an icon to carry with me till we saw one another again. Trang agreed but he chose his words carefully. He kept looking around like he thought the place was haunted.

  He asked, “How is your pregnancy going?”

  “That is one thing I do very well, without great effort or trouble, Uncle. I have babies.”

  “This one will be bigger than your first two. Your husband is a big man.”

  “Do you expect the child to be a devil, too?”

  Trang smiled thinly. “Not in the sense others might mean. But in the sense of Hong Tray’s prophecy, probably. Your grandmother was a wise woman. Her prophecies all come to pass—though not always in the manner we imagined when she offered them.”

  “She said nothing about any monster.”

  “What she said and what your mother and Doj heard were not necessarily the same. There are things people just don’t want to hear.”

  He had my interest on several fronts. I might learn something more about Uncle Doj. I might learn something about this prophecy of Hong Tray’s, which, so far, was almost as mysterious as the concerted determination of all Taglians that the Black Company had to be some sort of catastrophe in the making, worse than any flood or earthquake. Trang disappointed me. He said nothing more. In fact, he struck a listening attitude.

  I popped into the hallway.

  The man I had frightened before was returning. And he was bringing friends.