by K. J. Parker
“That’s right.” A slight frown on Valens’ face. He opened his hand and stared at the counter, then glanced away, as if he’d been looking into the sun. “Just like you told me to.”
Ziani shrugged. “If I said that, I can’t have been expressing myself clearly; in which case, I apologize. But anyway, things have changed since then. I don’t think wandering about is a viable option.”
“Agreed.” Valens winced. “But what choice is there?”
“Withdrawal to a place of safety.”
“No such thing.”
“Yes there is.” Ziani dropped down on his knees beside Valens and lowered his voice. “With the Cure Hardy; the Aram Chantat. You remember, they suggested it themselves.”
Valens pulled a face. “So did my dear wife,” he said. “She told me I should take my people across the desert. Acceptable losses, she said. With hindsight, we’d have been better off doing that. But we can’t do it now. We’ve lost too many people already.”
“We can cross the desert,” Ziani said.
Valens scowled at him. “That’s it, is it? Your brilliant idea?”
“We can cross the desert,” Ziani repeated evenly, “because there’s a way. A string of oases, each of them no more than two days on from the last one.” He pulled the map out of his satchel and laid it flat on the ground, weighing the corners down with small stones. “I learned about it from a merchant, the widow of a man who used to trade salt. You can cross the desert in three days.”
Valens smiled. “She sold you this map.”
“It wasn’t like that.” Ziani heard fear in his own voice. “We were going to go into partnership, to revive her husband’s old salt run. This was our secret weapon, if you like.”
“I see. And you were going to put up the money. Did she try and sell you any public buildings while she was at it?”
Just at the last minute, when you’ve built a machine, there’s one crucial component, and it won’t fit; or it binds and the wheel won’t turn or the key jams halfway down the keyway. You tell yourself it only needs a few moments of fettling with files and stones. The essential thing is not to try and force it. “I know it’s there,” he said.
“You’ve been there? Tried it out for yourself?”
Ziani shook his head. “I read the dead husband’s journals,” he said. “Logs and daybooks, schedules of expenses. He used the route for seven years.”
“Really. And then he just stopped.”
“Yes. But for a very good reason. He died.”
Valens flipped the counter again. This time he dropped it. “How sad. So, why didn’t his widow sell the secret to someone else, if she didn’t like running the route herself?”
Ziani grinned. “Nobody would’ve bought it. Not safe, you see.”
“Not safe. You’re doing a wonderful job of persuading me.”
“Not safe,” Ziani said doggedly, “because one of his contacts had given away the secret to a Cure Hardy bandit chief. That’s how the husband died; the Cure Hardy ambushed him. Once they’d started infesting the route, who’d want to buy it?”
Valens sighed. “Sorry if I’m being unreasonably skeptical,” he said, “but if the Cure Hardy knew about a short cut across the desert, why did my dear wife and her party come the long way round, with half of them dropping dead along the way?”
But when the component finally fits, there’s a soft, firm click and the wheel begins to run. “I believe the secret was lost when the bandit chief and his raiding party got themselves wiped out. They’d kept it to themselves, for obvious reasons. Nobody else knew about it, apart from my merchant’s husband.”
“You’re speculating.”
“Not really,” Ziani said. “The bandit’s name was Skeddanlothi, and you killed him.”
Valens picked another counter off the board, gripping its rim between thumb and forefinger. “The name rings a bell,” he said.
“Skeddanlothi and his gang were raiding quite deep in Vadani territory; near here, in fact. Just over those mountains, and —”
“Thank you, yes, I remember.” Valens frowned. “It’s true, I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how they’d managed to get this deep into our space without being picked up on the border; come to that, why it was worth their while coming all the way out here, across the desert, just to steal a few goats.” He switched the counter from his left hand to his right. “Have you got all these papers; the journals, and all that stuff ?”
Ziani shook his head. “But I did see them. I read them, every word. They bear out the map. I can describe each of the oases for you, if you like. At the first one, there’s a row of wooden sheds, where the merchant’s husband kept a stockpile of salt. There’s a pen for the horses, and a stone silo for grain and forage. The roof blew off it in a sandstorm, so it’s patched up in places. He had to take two mules loaded with slates to make good the damage. There’s probably still some grain left in the bins, though it’ll be six years old at the very least. I don’t know if grain keeps that long.”
“If it’s dry and dark,” Valens said absently, “and the rats haven’t got in. But of course I can’t check any of this unless I actually go there.”
Ziani shrugged. “It was in the journals.”
“Presumably this merchant of yours had employees,” Valens went on. “They’d have known the route. Why haven’t any of them tried to use the secret? Can you produce one of them to back up your claim?”
“No, of course not.” Ziani scowled. “There were four of them. Two died in the ambush. One died about six months later. The other one borrowed money from the widow to set up a grain mill at Gannae Flevis. He was still making payments, the last time I spoke to the widow.”
Valens nodded. “What about her?” he said. “If she was living in the city, she ought to be somewhere in the convoy.”
Ziani shook his head. “She didn’t like the idea,” he said. “She told me she was going to join her niece’s mule-train, trading fabrics with the Cure Doce. I’m sorry, I didn’t ask for any details, so I’ve got no idea where she’s likely to be.”
“That’s a nuisance,” Valens said. He yawned. “Sorry, I’m a bit weary. It’s been a long day. And you’ll have to excuse my skepticism,” he went on. “But — well, let’s suppose somebody wanted to hand me over to the Mezentines, on a silver dish with an apple in my mouth. It’d help enormously if I could be persuaded to take a specified route, so they’d know exactly where to wait for me.”
“There is that.” Ziani had caught his breath. “Assuming you think I’d want to do such a thing. And that the Republic would negotiate with me. But I guess you don’t think that.”
Valens snuggled his back against the hub of the wheel, as though scratching an itch. “Anything’s possible,” he said. “I could build up a fairly convincing case if I wanted to. For a start, where did you get to when the rest of us left the city? Yes, I know you went to Boatta and picked up the miners. But maybe you didn’t go straight there. Maybe you took a detour to meet someone; a Mezentine, maybe, with an interesting offer to put to you. Help us end the war and you can come home, no hard feelings. Maybe even your old job back, in the weapons factory. A man could be tempted.”
“You think so?”
“I would be, for sure.” Valens shrugged. “Assuming I could believe they really meant it. It can be a real bitch sometimes, can’t it, knowing who you can believe in.”
“If you say so.”
“For example,” Valens said, “there’s this Miel Ducas, and his cousin; the one who got killed just now. They were convinced, both of them, that you were up to no good. The Ducas was sure that you were responsible for him getting arrested for treason. He even went as far as to tell his cousin you’d admitted it, to his face. And Jarnac Ducas told one of his senior officers, who told someone else … Maybe the story got stretched a bit in the retelling, I don’t know. It all strikes me as a little bit far-fetched.”
“Actually,” Ziani said, “it’s perfectly true. I foun
d out about —well, the letter. I thought I could do myself some good with Duke Orsea by telling him. I wanted to get sole command of the defense of Civitas Eremiae.”
“Really? Why?”
“Because my scorpions were the defense, mostly,” Ziani replied with a shrug. “I didn’t want some amateur nobleman interfering. Also, I wanted Miel Ducas’ job. And his land, and his money. Didn’t do me much good in the end, of course. But he was guilty, remember. It’s not like I forged the letter.”
Valens smiled. “That’s true,” he said. “You didn’t write the letter, I did. You just carried out your duty as a loyal subject. Not that you were one, of course.” He yawned again, though this time it was forced. “My father had a saying,” he continued. “I love treachery, he used to say, but I can’t stand traitors. He was full of stuff like that. Other people’s lines, mostly, but he passed them off as his own. Never fooled anybody. Credibility, you see. He told so many lies, people tended not to believe him even when he was telling the truth. Personally, I’ve always tried to be the opposite: tell the truth, and people know where they stand with you.” He frowned, then said, “Let me have a look at that map.”
Ziani handed it to him. Valens glanced at it.
“There has been a traitor working for the Mezentines,” he went on. “That’s how come there was a full regiment of Mezentine cavalry waiting for us at Cor Evenis, down on the main east road. For all I know they’re still there, wondering why we haven’t shown up yet. I told the traitor that’s where we were headed, just before we left the city; then I sent some fast scouts, to see if there was an ambush laid for us. They reported back just before the attack on the column here; too late for me to do anything about it, because the traitor got killed in the battle. You may have come across him; General Mezentius.”
“He was a —”
Valens nodded. “Rather a shock to me. Still, I suppose he figured we didn’t stand a chance in the war, and wanted to get in with the winning side. Can’t blame him. Loyalty’s a wonderful thing, but any virtue taken to excess turns into stupidity in the end. The silly part of it is, it was a Mezentine who told me about him; inadvertently, of course. Anyway, that’s beside the point. The question is, do I believe in you and your map? And if I believe in you, do I also believe there really is a road across the desert?” He sighed. “It’d be lovely if I could,” he said. “Even if the Mezentines managed to follow us, I don’t suppose they’d want to risk upsetting the Cure Hardy. I get the impression that they’re the only force on earth your lot are genuinely scared of; not that it’s ever lost them any sleep, because there’s that wonderful desert in the way, keeping them penned in like a bull in a paddock. If ever they got the idea that the desert could be crossed after all, I reckon they might make some serious changes to their entire foreign policy.” He closed his eyes. “I’m not entirely sure how the Aram Chantat will react if I turn up without their crown princess. They’re likely to be upset, but whether with me or the Perpetual Republic I couldn’t safely predict. There’s also the fact that I’ve sent out a lot of scouts — good men, my own personal intelligence corps — and they assure me there aren’t any Mezentine forces I don’t already know about lurking behind rocks this side of the city. If you really were leading me into an ambush, they’d probably have found the assault party by now. A regiment of heavy cavalry’s not an easy thing to hide in open country.”
Ziani reminded himself to breathe. “And the map?” he said.
“Oh heavens, the map.” Valens nodded. “Well now, let’s see. Take away your motive for lying, and we’re more or less forced to accept that you’re telling the truth. In which case, you sincerely believe in the map. I don’t think you’re the sort of man who buys treasure maps from people you meet in the street. In which case, it’s likely that the salt woman — her name’s Henida Zeuxis, and she used to live next door to the Temperance and Tolerance in the Horsefair, right? See? I know all sorts of things about people, including where they go on their days off — most likely the salt woman believes in the map as well. So the gamble is, was her husband lying to her, or exaggerating? I don’t know. You’ve met her, I haven’t. What do you think?”
Easy as that, apparently; at the end, after all the filing and shaping and fettling and fitting. “I don’t think she’d got the imagination to lie, or the skill to forge the journals. And if her old man was as half-witted as her, he must’ve hit on something really good, or he’d have gone out of business. He strikes me as a plodder, your ideal employee. I had men just like him working for me at the ordnance factory. If he’d been a horse, you could’ve stuck him on a treadmill and forgotten about him till his next feed was due. Yes, I believe in her, and the map, and the short cut across the desert. For what my opinion’s worth.”
Valens breathed out, like a man putting down a heavy sack. “That’s what it comes to,” he said. “Little scraps of trivia about unremarkable people swaying the fate of the whole Vadani nation. My father’d be livid if he could see me now. He always reckoned that making history was strictly the preserve of the upper classes.” He shook his head. “You’d never have thought it to look at him, especially when he’d been drinking, but he was an idealist. There was an old boy on the council who used to say to him, you act like we’re living in the upstairs rooms when in fact we’re camping out on the midden. My father could never figure out what he meant by that, but he was right.” Ziani watched him pull himself together. “All right, then, we’ll give it a try. Oh, and thanks.” He grinned wearily. “Consider yourself provisionally awarded the rank of Hero of the Vadani People and public benefactor, first class. There’s no salary, but if we end up anywhere half civilized, I’ll get a medal struck or something.”
“Thank you,” Ziani said gravely. “That makes it all worth-while.”
Which left only one chore to be got out of the way. It could wait a little longer.
Meanwhile, there was plenty to do. Fixing up the carts was the priority. The arrival of the miners helped; the armor plates could be cannibalized off the worst-damaged wagons and fitted onto the miners’ carts; the rejects could then be stripped for parts to fix up the salvageable vehicles. Once the armor had been moved over, he let Daurenja take charge of bullying and cajoling the Vadani carpenters, while he concentrated on fabricating and fitting parts that had to be specially made: braces, brackets, reinforcing plates and the inevitable infinity of nails. Anything requiring even a little skill he did himself; partly because experience had greatly increased his contempt for Vadani metalwork, partly because it was a sweet pleasure to be bashing and filing metal again; as though he was back in the factory; as though nothing had happened. Working with iron and steel was a holiday after so long spent forging and shaping human beings; unlike people, rods and billets responded predictably to fire and hammer, and when you cut into them you got filings, not blood.
Valens’ scouts started coming back with thoughtful looks on their faces. They hadn’t seen an army, or outriders, or any trace that a large body of soldiers had been on the move. Instead, they muttered about finding abandoned farmhouses, barns that were empty when they should have been packed with hay; a merchant convoy glimpsed in the distance that left the road as soon as it saw them; a newly built bridge across a small river in the middle of nowhere.
No interference from the Duke, at any rate. Instead of being everywhere all the time, nosing about, asking maddeningly good questions, he’d become increasingly hard to find. The consensus of opinion was that he was lying low in order to avoid Duke Orsea, who was on his case because of the Eremian nobleman, Ducas, who was still being held confined in a small, stinking corral with the other prisoners.
There were other excitements, eagerly discussed in raised voices over the incessant thump of hammers. A large party of the scavengers who’d done so well out of trotting along at the heels of the running battle, like a sausage-maker’s dog, had been rounded up and brought in. They were penned up in a hollow square of empty lamp-oil jars and vinegar barrels, t
ied up, ignored by everyone except their guards, grudgingly and sporadically fed, mostly on soup made out of slightly spoiled barley which the horses were too picky to touch. What Valens wanted them for was a complete and perfect mystery. Better to wring their necks straightaway and save their food, even if it was just condemned horse-fodder.
Predictably, the weather took a turn for the worse. It started as fine, light rain, the kind that saturates your clothes before you realize you’re getting wet. Then it poured. The dust turned instantly into thick, sticky mud, weighing down boots and gumming up hands, messing up tools, swallowing a dropped nail or pin, spoiling tolerances, souring tempers. It’s hard to cut to the thickness of a nail-scribed line when your eyes are full of water, and every time you shift your feet, the ground under them tries to suck off your footwear. Forced into the cramped shelter of the wagons, the civilians suffered noisily, wringing hearts and wasting time. Rainwater seeped into sloppily sealed flour barrels, dripped through tears in wagon canopies, swelled timbers and coated bolts and spindles with a sheen of tacky orange rust. Soon there were no dry clothes to change into, and men’s boots squelched in the morning when they crammed their feet into them. Valens sat under an awning and gazed wretchedly at the road, wondering if it was impassable yet. A rill off the side of the mountain swelled into a river in spate and washed two carts (two fully refurbished, perfectly roadworthy carts) off the road and down the slope, where they rolled onto the rocks and were scrunched into kindling. The forge fires bogged down into black sooty ooze and couldn’t be relit. The work, nearly complete, was now clearly doomed to take forever. If the Mezentines didn’t get them first, they were all going to drown; swallowed in their sleep by the mud.
