The Crimson Campaign

Chapter 20

Tamas listened to his stomach growl as his charger trotted along the road at the rear of the column. Ahead of him, the men of the Ninth Brigade shuffled to the crack of a single drummer boy’s snare. The air was hot and oppressive, even with the cover of tall pine trees. The summer humidity soaked through Tamas’s soiled jacket and made every breath a labor.

He watched one of the infantry in the column ahead of him. The man was tall, with dirty-blond hair pulled back in a ponytail over one shoulder. About twenty minutes ago his shoulders had started to sway dangerously as he marched. He’d be the next to faint. Tamas would have put money on it.

Every so often the soldiers would glance back at Tamas’s charger with hungry eyes. They watched with the same looks every scout and officer who was still riding. It was unsettling.

They’d slaughtered the last of the Kez horses two days ago and distributed the meat. Tamas heard rumor that some of the company quartermasters were holding back and selling the last precious pounds. He’d tried to get to the bottom of it, but no one would confess. Every stream they passed saw a dozen men leave the line, throwing themselves into the mud in search of tiny fish and crawdads. Their sergeants had to beat them back into the column.

“They think they’re going to get a meal soon,” Olem said.

Tamas shook himself from his reverie. He felt light-headed, weak. He’d not eaten in four days. The men on their feet needed it more than he did. At least there was some periodic grazing for the horses.

Olem pointed up to a pair of buzzards circling high above the treetops.

“Ah,” Tamas said.

“They’ve been following us for fifty miles,” Olem said.

“You can’t be sure it’s the same vultures.”

“One of ’em has red on the tips of his feathers.”

Tamas grunted. Words were coming slow out of his mouth. The heat didn’t make him feel much like talking.

“That red-tipped buzzard kept on when most of the others stayed behind at the camp two mornings ago, when we slaughtered the horses.” Olem pursed his lips. “I think he’s hoping for the big payday.”

Tamas looked up at the buzzards. He didn’t want to talk about them. He’d seen far too many on far too many battlefields. “I haven’t seen you smoke for a week,” he said.

“Too bloody hot, pardon the language, sir.” Olem patted his breast pocket. “Besides. I’m saving my last one.”

“A special occasion of some kind?”

Olem continued to watch the buzzards. “Gavril told me we might be making a stand at the Fingers. I figure it’ll be nice to die with a cigarette between my lips.”

Tamas couldn’t help but scowl. “Have you told anyone? About the stand, I mean.”

“No, sir.”

“Damned Gavril. Needs to keep his mouth shut.”

“So it’s true, then?”

“I don’t intend to make a last stand, Olem. I intend to break the Kez. Last stands are for men who plan on losing.”

“Quite right, sir.”

Tamas sighed inwardly. Soldiers had a strange sense of fatalism. Most of them didn’t realize that any odds could be beaten with the right maneuvering.

“Olem…” Tamas began.

“Sir?”

“About what I saw the other day…”

A muscle jumped in Olem’s jaw. “What do you mean, sir?”

“I think you know what I mean. Vlora. If I’d come a few minutes later, I think I would have found the two of you in a much more compromising position.”

“That was the hope, sir.”

Tamas blinked. He’d not expected that kind of bluntness. “Can’t hold your tongue to save face, can you?”

“Not to save my life, sir.”

“I won’t have that kind of fraternization, Olem.”

“What kind, sir?” The corners of Olem’s eyes tightened.

“You and Vlora. She is a captain, you are–”

“A captain,” Olem said. “You made me one yourself.” He touched the gold pins on his lapels helpfully.

Tamas cleared his throat and looked up. Those damned buzzards were still there. “I mean that she is a powder mage. You know my mages are a different contingent of the army. I won’t have you crossing that line.”

Olem looked like he wanted to say something. He worked his jaw around, chewing on a phantom cigarette. “Yes, sir. Whatever you say, sir.”

The sarcasm in Olem’s tone leaked through like water through paper. It nearly shocked Tamas. Olem was normally so loyal, so quick to obey. He opened his mouth, a rebuke on his tongue.

The soldier with a ponytail staggered and fell out of line, hitting the ground hard. Two of his companions stopped to help him.

“Head up the line,” Tamas said. “Call for rest. The men need a sit-down.”

Only too grateful to get away, Olem spurred his mount on, calling out, “Field Marshal orders the column to halt! Fall out!”

Tamas could hear the order repeated farther up the column. Slowly, the line of soldiers came to a stop. Some men went looking for the closest stream, some men relieved themselves in the woods, and others slumped to the ground where they were, too exhausted to move.

Tamas opened his canteen and drained the last few drops. The water was hot and tasted of the metal. “Soldier,” Tamas said, pointing to a man who looked the least worse for the wear. “Find me some clean, cold water and fill this, then tell your sergeant you’re off latrine duty tonight.”

The soldier took the canteen. “Aye, sir.”

Tamas climbed down from his charger and hung the reins from a tree limb. He paced the width of the road, trying to work some feeling back into his legs after riding half the day. He stopped once and looked south. No sign of the Kez. The woods were too thick. According to the latest reports, the head of the Kez column was ten miles back. They had dragoons ranging in the area in between, trying to catch Adran stragglers and harass the end of the Adran column, but what mattered to Tamas was where the bulk of the cavalry were.

He was going to need that heavy lead.

“Sir.”

Tamas turned to find Vlora standing next to his charger. Her uniform was dirty, jacket loosened at the neck, her black hair tied back behind her head. He had the brief image of her naked beneath the waterfall, leaning in to kiss Olem. He willed the image away, trying not to let his embarrassment show on his face.

“Captain.”

“How is the leg, sir?”

Tamas flexed the muscles in his leg, felt them twinge. Riding hadn’t helped it loosen at all, but the pain wasn’t too bad. “It’s fine, thank you. Any luck hunting?”

“The deer are keeping well away from the column. If we range more than a mile or two from the road, we won’t be able to carry our prey back. A few squirrels and rabbits. Enough to keep the powder mages fed.”

At least his mages were keeping up their strength. He felt his stomach twist at the mention of rabbit.

“If we camped for more than one night, or even slowed down a bit, we might be able to bag some deer.”

“Sorry, Captain. I can’t allow that. We have to reach the Fingers well ahead of the Kez.”

“The scouts say we’ll be there in two days, sir.”

“That’s right,” Tamas said. “Once we cross the first river, we’ll burn the bridge and take it easy for a couple of days. Rest and restock.”

“I certainly hope so, sir. The men are looking poor.”

Tamas turned his attention to the soldier who had fainted. He was sitting up now, drinking out of a canteen, talking to one of his fellows. Tamas clasped his hands behind his back and faced Vlora.

“Captain, you and I both know that what happened the other day was completely out of order.”

Vlora didn’t even blink. “You mean, when you watched me bathe?”

Tamas could have slapped her for that. Damned girl. She knew what he wanted to say, and she wasn’t going to make it easy.

“You and Olem…”

“Sir, I don’t think that’s any of your business. With all due respect.”

“I am your commanding officer–”

“Yes, sir. And you’ve always made it very clear that what two soldiers want to do in their spare time is up to them, as long as it doesn’t break convention between the ranks.”

“This is different.” This was different, Tamas told himself. “I won’t have one of my Marked gallivanting around with my bodyguard, do you understand? I won’t have my bodyguard going around with… with…”

“A whore?”

She had spoken quietly, but Tamas felt the breath taken from him.

“That’s what you want to say, isn’t it, sir? You want to call me a whore for what I did to Taniel? A slut? I can hear the words on the tip of your tongue, even if you don’t speak them.”

“Watch your tone, soldier,” Tamas warned.

“Permission to speak freely, sir?”

“Permission denied.”

Vlora ignored him. “You don’t think I know what I did to Taniel? You don’t think it kills me inside knowing that I threw away everything we had for a few months of passion with some idiot?”

“Permission denied, Captain.”

“You don’t hear the men talk.” Vlora’s voice rose. “You don’t hear what everyone says about me behind my back – even to my face. You don’t see the sneers. ‘Vlora, she’ll spread her legs for anyone now.’ You don’t hear them whisper that outside your tent at night, placing bets on who can be the first to get me on my back.”

“Permission denied!” Tamas stepped forward. Any other soldier would have shrunk beneath the red fury in Tamas’s eyes, but Vlora refused to back down.

“I spent eighteen months alone while Taniel was in Fatrasta because you sent him there. Taniel, the war hero. People talked about how every woman in Fatrasta was ready to throw themselves on him. And then to hear he had a little savage girl, following him everywhere. What was I supposed to think of that? No man would look twice at me at the university. They knew who I was. They were too afraid of Taniel to say any nice thing to me.”

Vlora spat the words in Tamas’s face, her voice dripping with bitterness, her whole body trembling with rage. “Then a man appears who doesn’t care whose fiancée I am. He charms me, loves me, and assures me there’s not another in the world that can make him so happy. I trusted him.” Vlora’s face twisted in disgust. “Then I find out he was bedding me just to make you look bad.”

The pain in Vlora’s eyes and the malice in her voice was more than Tamas could bear. Once, he had been her father, her friend, her mentor. But now he had become nothing more to her than an object of hatred, an enemy to despise.

“Get out of my sight, Captain. If we weren’t at war, I’d have you court-martialed.”

Vlora leaned forward, closer than anyone who didn’t know Tamas as well as she did would have dared. Close enough to embrace him. Close enough to stick a knife in his ribs if she wanted. “Kill me yourself, if you want it done so badly,” she said. “Don’t hand the job over to lesser men.”

She whirled on her heel and strode down the column. Soldiers stared openmouthed at her as she went past, then turned to look toward Tamas, waiting for his wrath to follow like thunder after lightning.

Tamas watched Vlora almost disappear around a bend in the road. She made an abrupt stop as Olem rode into view. The bodyguard leaned over his horse, said something to her. She put her hand on his thigh. He pushed it away gently and gave a meaningful glance at Tamas.

Vlora grabbed Olem by the belt and pulled him off his horse, pushing him into the woods off the trail. Tamas swore under his breath and took two steps down the column.

Someone cleared their throat. Tamas looked around.

It was the soldier he’d sent for water. “Your canteen, sir.”

Tamas snatched the canteen. When he looked again, Olem and Vlora were gone.

He took several deep breaths and went back to his horse.

“Sir, you mind if I ask how long until we march again?” the soldier asked.

Tamas took a long draw of water. It was so frigid it seemed to burn his throat going down. It made his teeth hurt.

“Thirty minutes, damn it. Get some rest.”

Adamat rapped on the door of the foreman’s office in the textile mill. Below him, dozens of steam-powered looms thundered at full tilt throughout the day, creating a racket that drowned out all but the loudest shouts. Hundreds of workers tended the millworks, moving about the floor like so many insects.

Adamat let himself into the foreman’s office. Inside, the sound was greatly reduced.

“Margy,” he called.

The woman emerged from the back of the room and smiled when she saw Adamat. He leaned in and kissed her on the cheek.

She stepped back from him in shock. “What in all the Nine have you done to yourself?”

“Fell down the stairs,” Adamat said. His voice whined nasally, and his face still hurt as if the broken nose had happened only an hour ago.

Margy harrumphed. “Looks more like you got it punched in,” she said. “I alway told you putting your nose in other people’s business was going to get it broken.”

Adamat threw his hands up in mock surrender. “I’ve only got a moment, Margy. I just dropped by to see if you had a lead on that rug.”

“Fine, fine.” Margy moved over to the desk beside her microscope and began leafing through papers. “I sent Faye a letter last week,” she said.

“I’ll ask if she got it.” Adamat leaned against the doorpost and closed his eyes. His face hurt. His back hurt. His hands and his head hurt. Everything hurt, and he wasn’t getting enough sleep. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d eaten more than toast and tea. He opened his eyes again when Margy pushed a piece of paper into his hand.

“That’s the buyer,” she said. “I couldn’t get a name, just the address from a check receipt.”

“Thanks, Margy.”

“Tell Faye to come visit soon, will you?”

“Of course.”

Adamat left the textile mill and didn’t look at the paper until he was outside. With no name, it would be more work for him to find out the owner of the address, and knowing the Proprietor, Adamat would have to go through several layers of fake names and addresses before he found the Proprietor’s identity.

He hailed a hackney cab and looked at the address.

He had to look again, blinking to be sure his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him.

This was an address he knew.

The weather had grown overcast as the morning progressed, and Adamat stopped by his safe house in western Adopest to get an umbrella. He paused in the hallway. The door to the flat was open.

Part of him screamed to just turn and walk away. He might not survive the next run-in with Vetas’s goons.

He drew his pistol and checked to see if it was loaded before pushing gently on the door.

SouSmith sat on the sofa. His arms were folded over his stomach, his chin resting on his chest as he dozed. His shirt was covered in blood.

“SouSmith?”

The big boxer jerked awake. “Ah.”

“What happened?”

SouSmith cocked an eyebrow at him, as if it were strange of Adamat to ask after his bloody shirt. “What happened yourself? Someone break your nose?”

Adamat called for the landlady to put a kettle on, and closed the door behind him. “You’re soaked with blood.”

“None of it’s mine,” SouSmith said. “Least, not much. Nose?”

“One of Vetas’s goons was waiting at my old house. Hit me in the face with a cudgel. Now what’s this? You can’t be sitting in a man’s living room covered in someone else’s blood without an explanation.”

“Four o’ Vetas’s men came by my brother’s place,” SouSmith said. “Shot one of my nephews. Me and Daviel… we killed all four.”

“Pit, SouSmith. I’m sorry. Is your nephew…?”

“Kid was twelve. Daviel had just got it together to send ’im to school.” SouSmith stood up and stretched. The blood on his shirt was black and dry, probably hours old. His piggish eyes glinted with anger. “I’m in,” he said. “Proprietor or no, I’m ’a see Vetas burn. Then I’ve got to see to my family.”

Adamat was about to ask what they did with the bodies when he remembered SouSmith’s brother was a butcher. He probably did not want to know. He gave a wary nod.

Could he trust SouSmith? What if Vetas’s goons had turned him? What if, like Adamat, SouSmith’s family was being held by Vetas?

Could he even afford to ask these questions? Adamat needed every man he could get on his side.

“Get cleaned up,” Adamat said. “You left some clothes here.”

“We going somewhere?”

“I have to see a man about fifty thousand krana.”

Adamat stepped out of the carriage in the Routs – the very best part of town, filled with large brick bankers’ houses. The streets were wide, paved with flat cobbles, and lined with towering elms. Adamat tilted his hat up and looked for the house he wanted.

There – in between two of the immense city townhouses owned by the wealthy bankers sat a small, austere house with a well-kept garden. Adamat headed up the walk to the house, followed closely by SouSmith.

“The Reeve, right?” SouSmith asked.

“Yes.” Ondraus the Reeve. One of Tamas’s councillors, and an architect of the coup that overthrew Manhouch. He was a sour, unfriendly old man. Adamat did not relish a second meeting. He pounded on the door.

He pounded for ten minutes before he finally heard the latch inside move, and the door opened a crack.

“For a wealthy man,” Adamat said, “I’m surprised you answer the door yourself.”

Ondraus the Reeve glared at Adamat through narrowed eyes. “Get off my front step, or I’ll have you jailed for harassment.” Ondraus was wearing a robe and slippers. His hair was unkempt.

“I need money,” Adamat said. “Your accountants told me I’ve been cut off.”

Ondraus sneered at him. “Tamas is dead. Whatever access to funds he promised you is gone. I’d suggest you find employment elsewhere.”

“See, that’s a problem. May I come in?”

“No.”

Adamat leaned on the door. Ondraus started, reeling back into his tiny foyer.

“Wait out here, please,” Adamat said to SouSmith. The boxer nodded.

Ondraus stormed toward his office. Adamat drew the pistol from his pocket and cleared his throat.

The Reeve froze when he saw the pistol. “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded.

Adamat drew his eyes across the room. It had changed little in the months since Adamat’s last visit. The mantel had been dusted, the fireplace cleaned, but the carpet showed no more wear and the smells were exactly the same. The house seemed almost unused.

“I can see through the open door to your office there,” Adamat said, “a bell cord. Hardly worth noticing on my last visit, but I find myself wondering, in a house with three rooms and no servants, why you have a bell cord.” Adamat motioned toward the only chair beside the fireplace. Ondraus took a seat.

“Are you here to rob me?” Ondraus said. “All my money is in investments. As you can see, there’s nothing of worth here. I don’t even keep a checkbook in my home.”

“See,” Adamat continued without acknowledging the interruption, “my guess is that bell cord leads to a system of rooms beneath your house, and in one of those rooms you have a permanent staff of four large, dangerous men ready to come to your defense if you need it. And off of those rooms leads a tunnel, likely going to one of these nearby manors that you own under a false name. You don’t live in it, of course. You just use it to conceal your comings and goings under your other name.”

Ondraus watched Adamat from the chair, saying nothing. His glare was less angry now and more… calculating. For some reason the change made him far more frightening.

“You haven’t yet told me that I’m a dead man,” Adamat said. He considered Ondraus for a moment. “I suppose you’re not the type.”

“What is your insurance?” Ondraus asked.

“Letters. Sent to certain friends I have in the police force.”

“Telling them that I am the Proprietor?”

It was a thrill to hear Ondraus say it out loud. No denial. No admission. A simple statement, and it made the hair on the back of Adamat’s neck stand up. “No, of course not. Telling them that if I disappear, my body can be found beneath your house. No one wants to investigate the Proprietor. But my friends on the force will have no problem combing through the affairs of one accountant. You’re known as a shut-in. Shut-ins are always interesting. My friends might even find it fun. And when they find out about the rooms beneath your house, and the bodyguards, and the manor and the huge amounts of money in your portfolio, they will become extremely interested indeed.”

Ondraus scoffed. “You think that will save you?”

“Yes, I do.” Adamat felt a crack in his confidence. What if Ondraus just didn’t care? A man with his connections could just disappear if an investigation started on him. “I think that my life is a trivial thing to spare, if it will save you even a few months’ worth of scrutiny and trouble.

“If that is not the case,” Adamat added, “I have sent another letter to a friend in the publishing business, telling him I know who the Proprietor is. If I wind up dead, and he hears of an investigation of my death involving you, he’ll draw conclusions and, let me say, he’s not a very smart man. He values headlines far more than his own life.”

Ondraus began to chuckle. It was a dry sound, and for a moment Adamat thought he was coughing. “Very clever,” he said.

“If you’d given me help, instead of deciding to let me take Vetas on my own, I wouldn’t have even wondered about your identity.”

“You’d have still wondered,” Ondraus said, waving one hand dismissively. “What do you want?”

“Fifty – no, seventy-five thousand krana in cash, and your help killing Lord Vetas and rescuing my wife.”

Ondraus steepled his fingers and leaned back. “You need to learn to get more out of your blackmail. I’m one of the richest men in the Nine.”

“I’m not interested in your money. I just want to get Faye back.”

“Vetas still has a Privileged.”

“That’s what the money is for. If I have the money, I’ll have my own Privileged.”

Ondraus mulled this over. “Resourceful. And if I decide to let you live once Vetas is dead?”

“I’ll forget you exist.”

“You surprise me, Adamat,” Ondraus said. His body was no longer tensed and angry. He lounged back in the chair, steepling his fingers. “The lengths you’re going to. I was warned years ago that you were the most principled, tenacious man on the Adopest police force. I actually have gone to a few small lengths to avoid you.”

“Believe me,” Adamat said. “If this didn’t involve my family, I wouldn’t be here.”

“Well, in that case, I have a stipulation. After this is over, you promise to work for me when I have need of you.”

“No.”

Ondraus held up his hand to forestall the protest. “I’ll pay you, if it happens. The work will likely be dangerous. But agree to this, or I’ll kill you and SouSmith, and see what happens.”

Adamat searched Ondraus’s eyes. There was an iron resolve there that told him Ondraus would do just that. And maybe… a hint of humor? A touch of a smile on his lips? Was Ondraus enjoying this?

“Agreed,” Adamat said.

“Wonderful.” Ondraus paused. “Does SouSmith know?”

“He thinks I’m here to ask for money,” Adamat said. He left out that he’d told SouSmith he planned on blackmailing the Proprietor. SouSmith might make his own deductions, or he might not. If he did, he was smart enough to keep quiet. No need telling Ondraus any of that.

“You’ll have it tomorrow,” Ondraus said. “I’ll have it delivered to…?”

“I’ll meet your man in Elections Square. By the stains.”

“You’re not to come here ever again,” Ondraus said. “Our contact will be through my eunuch. You may go now.”

Adamat slid his pistol into his pocket with the sudden realization that he was no longer in control.

“And Adamat,” Ondraus said, “if I ever have need to regret this, everyone you’ve ever loved will regret it too.”