Oath of Fealty

27

At the change of watch, Arcolin told Burek what had happened.

“I slept through that?” Burek looked ashamed.

“No harm done,” Arcolin said. “I may sleep through the next little problem. Wake me if you need me.”

He woke to the smell of breakfast cooking. That meant it was near dawn or after; the tent wasn’t as dark as it had been. He had one boot on when Burek poked his head into the tent. “Sir—good, you’re awake—”

“What is it?”

“The man died, and I thought you should know before the villagers found him—”

“Found him?”

“And the scene, I mean. He died about midwatch, so I told off a squad to take the body back to where the fight was. I thought that way we didn’t have to explain why we had his body here.”

Arcolin had a quick mental vision of four of his soldiers, two lugging the dead brigand’s body, over the fields in the dark. He could imagine the track they’d leave on the dew-wet grass—

“I worried about the track they might leave,” Burek went on. “But Stammel said the grass was dry enough, just be back here in a glass or less. And they were, and dewfall came after that.”

Arcolin pulled on his other boot and stamped down into it. “Good thinking,” he said. “I suppose you had them take his weapon back with him?”

Burek stared, then flushed. “No, sir—I didn’t think of that.”

“Never mind,” Arcolin said. “They’ll think someone stole it, or there was a third brigand.”

“Do we march today, after all this? The brigands must be near.”

“We march, because we’re not supposed to know the brigands are near.” And with luck they could be packed and on their way before the villagers found the dead men. “We know nothing, we heard nothing, we saw nothing … they told us no brigands were anywhere around and they’d had no trouble, so … we go on being ignorant.”

Burek grinned. “Stammel thought you’d say that.”

“Stammel is a wise man,” Arcolin said.

By the time the sun had cleared the trees beyond the fields, they were ready to march, leaving behind only flattened grass: the jacks filled in, scraps of food burnt to char and then the fire pit watered down and raked, the brambles pulled into a pile. Burek had arched his brows at the care taken.

“Leave a mess behind, find a worse mess when you return,” Arcolin said. “Duke’s saying; I expect he learnt it from Aliam Halveric. Farmers don’t like their fields and pastures damaged, and they’ll find ways to cause you trouble the next time you come through.”

Burek thought about that for a moment, then said, “Dead men aren’t a mess, then …?”

“Not if it’s nothing to do with us. They’ll think it does, but more like we drew trouble down on them, the brigands spying on us. That reminds me—” He turned, just as Tam came up with something wrapped in a cloth. “Ah—thank you, Tam.”

“It’s really pretty, Captain,” Tam said.

“It’ll go in the Company records as split between you and Vik,” Arcolin said. “It’ll be the end of season, most likely, before you see a copper out of it.”

“’Sfine, Captain. I just wondered.”

“And remember—no talking about it, anywhere we go.”

“No, Captain. I’ll tell Vik.” He paused. “I can tell Vik, can’t I?”

“Tell him not to talk about it. Nothing happened. That’s the important part. Nothing at all happened.”

Tam grinned, saluted, and hurried off. Arcolin unwrapped the cloth. The grip of it was made of some intricately carved bone or tooth—he didn’t want to meet the animal with such teeth—inlaid with gold and silver. No guard but a narrow flange of metal where the two met, and the blade itself had the waterflow pattern that meant the best steel.

“Rich brigands,” Burek said. “Or they’ve been robbing rich men.”

“Rich men with exceptional taste in weapons,” Arcolin said. “And this one’s seen considerable use.” The carving had worn down almost to the inlay, just where a hand would put the most pressure. He wrapped the cloth around it again. A shout came from behind the wagons, in the direction of the village. Several shouts. Arcolin loosened the cord of his saddle roll, pushed the wrapped weapon into the center, and retied the cord.

“Try to look stupid,” Arcolin said to Burek. “Whatever you do, don’t smile. Mount up.” He mounted his own horse, and turned it out of the lane, where he could see what was coming.

The rest of the cohort, now in marching formation in front of the wagons, were doing their own best to look stupid. Hurrying up the lane toward them was yesterday’s village headman and two others, waving their arms. Arcolin knew the wagon guards would stop them.

“Stammel, a hand with us, and start the rest down the road.”

“Captain.” Stammel named five, who fell out and lined up beside Arcolin and Burek. The others filled in, Stammel gave the command in a voice that could probably be heard in Cortes Vonja, and the cohort marched off, in perfect step. Behind them, the first wagon’s driver slapped reins together and yelled at the mules; harness creaked and harness rings jingled as that wagon, and then the next, followed.

“With me,” Arcolin said, and nudged his horse forward, toward the approaching villagers.

Faced with two armed men on horseback and five armed soldiers afoot, the villagers straggled to a halt, breathing heavily.

“What’s amiss?” Arcolin asked.

“You—you can’t leave—I demand—you killed four men!” the headman said.

“We did not kill four men,” Arcolin said with perfect honesty. “And you are not authorized to place demands on me—my contract is with Cortes Vonja, in whose outbounds your village lies.”

“I will report you to the city as thieves and murderers,” the headman said, less breathless now.

“Then I will report you as an arrant liar,” Arcolin said. “We stole nothing and we did not kill four men. We camped away from your village, as you requested; we left our camp clean and ready for use again as pasture. We brought our own supplies; we had no need to steal.”

“Two men from the village came to see you last night. I know they did.”

“They did indeed. Did you send them? Did they tell you that I sent them away? I do not deal with such as they—men afraid of the light, who whisper in the dark.”

“They’re dead,” the headman said. “They never came back from your camp, and this morning they’re dead, over there—” He waved in the general direction Arcolin knew was right. “You must have killed them—we have no weapons to take off heads.”

“You said four were killed—who were the others? And why were four of your people wandering around at night?”

The headman glanced at the other two men, who were still standing slack-jawed, staring at the soldiers. “They—we don’t know—maybe from another village—”

“They spoke to me of a robber band, as if they knew where it was—why not robbers?”

The headman paled. “We—we don’t have robbers here. I told you that.”

“But you do have four dead men. And one with his head cut off, you said. Would farmers from another village have swords?”

“Nay,” one of the other men spoke for the first time. “They don’t have swords no more than we do. But you folk have swords.”

“So we do,” Arcolin said. “But we were camped here last night, and you say the dead men are over there somewhere.” He waved in a direction slightly different from what the headman had indicated.

“Not that way, but there,” the second man said, eager now to correct him and pointing very specifically. Arcolin looked in that direction.

“Where?”

“There’s a mound, maybe sunhand away, and there’s trees on it—it’s not level so no use to clear it for a field.”

Arcolin translated this from peasant estimates of distance to those used by the Company. “And you found dead men there?”

“Aye, that I did. I been sent to track the headman’s bull that broke out last night, and once we were past the ploughland, my dog, he picked up the smell of blood, and I couldn’t call him off. It might’ve been the bull’s, after all.”

“And you found four dead men,” Arcolin prompted.

“Yes, and one with no head—it turned me right up, sir, it did indeed. That was Aren, married to m’wife’s third sister, and her baby coming any time. Noki, the other, he’s m’cousin by m’father’s sister, her husband, they has four, the youngest still at breast …”

“What about the two you didn’t know?” Arcolin asked.

“Never saw them before,” the headman said. He glared at the other man.

“That’s not right,” the third man said. “You spoke to that one with the big sword yourself, that time he come to the village to buy a goose, he said.”

“Be quiet,” the headman said. The other men said nothing, but from the sly looks, Arcolin knew they were enjoying the headman’s discomfort. “They don’t know, sir. They mistook his face. I never saw either of the others, and I still say it must’ve been you—or one of your men—that killed them.”

“I know it was not,” Arcolin said. “Do you think soldiers who have marched all day have nothing better to do than run around the countryside all night finding wandering peasants to kill?” The headman opened his mouth but Arcolin went on. “It’s clear to me that your two villagers stole your bull, took it away to sell to someone, probably a whole group of robbers, and there was a quarrel. The robbers killed your men, and then perhaps another quarrel, and the others made off with your bull, leaving four dead men behind. It’s nothing to do with us, but you might consider that two of your men knew more about robbers in your area than you did.”

“But—but you can’t just leave—” the headman said, as Arcolin lifted the reins and his horse took a step backward.

“My orders from the Cortes Vonja Council are to keep on the move until we drive brigands away,” Arcolin said. “Now they’ve got meat and know we’re in the area, they’ll be away from here. And your two who were in league with them are dead. Go back to work.” He backed his horse another three steps and spoke to Burek and the men. “Come now; we have work to do. Let these farmers do theirs.” He turned his horse in a showy spin and rode off, not looking back until he was sure they were out of earshot. Then he saw the farmers still standing in the road, the other two apparently haranguing the headman.

“That went well, sir,” said one of the five marching alongside.

“I wonder what he’s going to tell his brigand contact,” Arcolin said. “The next one, I mean. What a whey-faced little wiggler he is, too. I’m afraid that village is in for trouble, unless those two force a new selection.” He looked at the sky. The dawn’s limpid blue had faded to a harder sheen. West, wisps of cloud like wing feathers appeared high up. Sweat tickled his scalp under his helmet.

“Rain later today or tomorrow,” he said. “Good thing it wasn’t last night.”

“Do you really think they stole the headman’s bull?” Burek asked.

“No,” Arcolin said. “I think the headman’s bull doesn’t exist. We came through the village—did you see any bull yesterday?”

“Could’ve been out with the cows.”

“Could have. Except we passed cows with a cowherd and two dogs: no bull. I make it a practice to look in the pens in villages we pass, in case we’re accused of stealing livestock. The headman’s house—second on the left—had a stone-walled pigpen. Sow and litter of piglets on one side; a boar on the other. A fenced pen for cows, but no bull. Most of these villages share a bull between two or three of them. There was a bull in that first village we passed yesterday.”

Burek shook his head. “I’ve been with two other companies, and I never knew a captain to notice more than whether the village had enough to feed us. I’d heard the Duke’s Company was different.”

“The Duke always said you couldn’t tell which information was important until you needed it,” Arcolin said. “And we spent years down here, you know. I had time to learn.”

“I will learn,” Burek said.

Not, Arcolin noted, I’d like to learn, or I want to learn, or Teach me, but I will learn. He hadn’t had such a promising junior captain since Ferrault. He wondered suddenly if this was how Kieri had felt after hiring him. He remembered saying almost exactly the same thing, the first time Kieri explained why he’d done something.

“I’m sure you will,” he said to Burek. “Now, tell me what you notice about the fields we pass.”

Burek looked to either side. “Ploughland once,” he said. “Furrows grown over with grass—and grass that grows in damper places. Cow-paths … it’s pasture here. Rougher than behind us.”

“Easier to conceal people and animals in, wouldn’t you say?”

Burek looked again. “Not as flat as it looks at first,” he said. “Yes—that—” He pointed to a sinuous line of thicker growth in a slight hollow. “That could be a hidden stream.”

“When I was here last,” Arcolin said, “this, where old furrows show, was ploughland and that over there was grazed short. There’s a spring in there somewhere—it’s boggy across the way—but a good gravel-bottomed pool. That’s where they watered the village herds, back then. But I don’t see a regular path to it now. The population’s down, from that war, but you’d think they’d still use the water. Now they’re watering cattle upstream from the village. That’s not good practice.”

“I noticed that, yesterday,” Burek said. “I didn’t know this other water was here.”

“Land hereabouts, the water runs generally east—wiggling north or south, but meeting the Immer downstream of Cortes Vonja … it’s all in the Immer drainage. My guess is someone else is using that water now. Someone who knows a trail through the bog on the far side, so they can come to the village through the woods to the east.”

They were almost up with the cohort now; Arcolin waved; the wagon guards signaled ahead and Stammel halted the cohort for them to catch up. The soldiers moved back into their places, and Arcolin spoke to the teamsters and guards.

“We’re being watched,” he said. “I want everyone alert, both sides and behind—notice everything and I’ll take your report at nooning and evening. That headman was lying; the others were scared.”

Once in the lead again, Arcolin changed the formation, putting out flanking scouts for the first time. “We need the practice,” he told Stammel. “I don’t think anyone will attack today, but just in case.”

“Mounted or afoot, sir?” Stammel asked.

“Mounted, so we don’t slow,” Arcolin said. “Stay in sight. I’m most interested in who’s watching from near the road, and in assessment of the cover.”

“Notice the animals,” he said to Burek, when they were moving again. “The scouts are out far enough that they shouldn’t disturb rabbits and birds nearer the road. We should see a little movement of animals into the cover beside the road, but anything moving out of cover toward the scouts means something else is in there.”

Nothing showed for almost a glass, in Arcolin’s estimation. The pasture land continued to roughen; along the line of the unseen stream, brush thickened to a line of scrubby trees. Then, as that bore away eastward, a flock of pink-fronted doves racketed up and away, and downstream of them, another.

Arcolin held up his hand; the cohort halted. “They’d need someone closer,” he said to Burek. On the right, ahead, the ruins of what he remembered as a herder’s night-shelter canted sideways; next to it, a thicket had grown up where he remembered a small cattle pen. “There, for instance. Let’s see what happens when our flanking scout gets closer.”

The scout, checking position on the cohort, had reined in; Arcolin signaled her on. “Watch the horse’s ears,” he told Burek. Another five strides, and the horse lifted its head, ears pricked.

“It’s seen something,” Burek said.

“Right,” Arcolin said. The scout loosened her sword and rode on. Two more strides, and four crows lifted from the thicket, cawing. The scout glanced back. Arcolin signaled again; she turned her horse a little away and held position.

“One hand to flank,” he said quietly to Stammel. “Two hands with me. We want him alive, if we can.” To Burek, he said, “Come on—we’ll try to cut him off.” He drew his sword and legged his horse to a hand gallop. Burek caught up with him; they passed the ruin and thicket. Beyond, an ungrazed field had grown up in tall grass and patches of scrub. Arcolin looked to the left—no sign anyone had crossed yet.

“He’s probably got a crossbow,” Arcolin said. “And he’ll probably shoot at us. But if we make him run, he won’t be very accurate.”

“There,” Burek said, pointing to the right. Arcolin, too, saw grass move against the breeze.

“Good eye,” Arcolin said. He legged his horse into a gallop, trusting Burek to follow. The movement ahead quickened. Arcolin yelled; his horse flattened out, crashing through the tall grass and weeds for a point ahead of the movement. He could hear Burek behind him. The grass stilled—the man was getting ready to shoot. Arcolin shifted his weight; his horse threw a flying change, veering sideways, then another and then he saw the man, struggling to span his bow again. One jump, and Arcolin’s horse was there, skidding to a halt; Arcolin swung his sword, knocking the crossbow from the man’s hand. Burek pulled to a halt on the man’s other side, as the man snatched a short curved blade and swung at Arcolin’s horse.

Burek rode closer, tried to hit the man with the flat of his blade, but the man whirled, and Burek’s horse took a cut on the chest, and reared. One hoof caught the man’s arm; Arcolin swung his cloak over the man’s head as he staggered, blinding him, then leaned over and hit him as Burek had planned. The man dropped. Burek was off his horse and leapt onto the man’s back and pulled his arms back before he could struggle. Arcolin looked back. His tensquad was making its noisy way through the weeds now, halfway to them. He waved to the scout, calling her in, and saw her pass the signal to the hand of men headed for the ruin. Burek’s horse stood quietly, for a wonder, head drooping. Had the blade been poisoned?

He dismounted and walked over to the horse. A bad gash, gaping open, but not life threatening in itself. He took the reins. “Burek, that blade may be poisoned. When the tensquad gets here, try to keep our prisoner from cutting himself on it.”

“Is my horse all right?” Burek asked.

“I’m not sure. He’s quieter than I’d expect.” Arcolin looked the horse over. No other injuries. Sweaty, but they’d galloped and the day was increasingly hot and humid. The horse blew into his hand; Arcolin sniffed. “What’s he like? You’ve had him long enough now.”

“Solid, I’d say. Sound, well trained. Not as spirited as yours. By his teeth, two years older than the seller told me; I got a nata knocked off his price for that.”

“We’ll hope it’s just a quiet disposition,” Arcolin said. Blood dripped freely from the wound; horses always bled a lot, in his experience, and could lose much more blood than a man before falling over.

Devlin arrived with the tensquad; in moments they had the prisoner yanked upright, the cloak off his head, and trussed. Arcolin warned them about the blade, and they left it for him to examine. Burek came over to his horse. “It’s bad …”

“The surgeons can sew it up, if he’s as quiet as you say. You’ll have to ride your spare.” Arcolin gave the reins of both horses to Burek and went to look at the blade. Like the other, it had no guard but a simple flange; the grip was less ornate, made of wood carved into ribs. The blade was smeared with horse blood; Arcolin sniffed. Under the smell of blood was the odor of something else. He picked the blade up by its grip, and handed it to Devlin. “It’s got something on it, probably a contact poison. Wrap it up and bring it along.”

The prisoner meanwhile had said nothing, made no attempt to escape. Arcolin looked at him, and was reminded of the men in Alured the Black’s camp. Darkly sunmarked, as expressionless as a carving, no fear in his eyes, he might have been standing sentry somewhere instead of being bound in hostile hands. He had an old scar on his face, and doubtless more elsewhere on his body. Arcolin looked him up and down. No change in expression at all.

“Get him back to the road,” he said. “Send the surgeon.” Then he turned to Burek. “How’s he doing?”

“Bleeding’s slowed,” Burek said.

“We don’t want to be here too long,” Arcolin said. “I’ll leave the scout and five with you. I need to go see our prisoner.” He mounted. “Hand up your saddle; I’ll see someone saddles your spare and brings it out to you.” He went back to the road in an arc, checking the road ahead of the cohort for anything suspicious. The flanking scout on the far side waved a clear, and Arcolin rode back down toward the cohort. Stammel, as he expected, had set up a temporary perimeter, wagons in the middle.

“Prisoner’s tied to a wagon wheel,” he said. Arcolin handed down Burek’s saddle.

“He’ll need his other mount,” he said.

“Will the horse make it?” Stammel pointed to one of the men, who took the saddle and went to get Burek’s spare from those tied to the last wagon.

“If the poison wasn’t strong enough. If he can walk fast enough to keep up with us.” He hoped it would. They would not easily find a replacement in southern Cortes Vonja; it wasn’t good horse country. He dismounted and went to look at their prisoner. The man was staring straight ahead, ignoring everything or pretending to.

“I’m sure you recognize the uniform,” Arcolin said. “That scar on your face is at least three years old; you would have seen us before.”

No response, not the flicker of an eyelid.

“Some men prefer death to life, and that’s a choice any man can make,” Arcolin said. “You will shortly have that choice. You can tell me one of three things: who your leader is, where your leader is, or who hired your band. Or you can die. Think about it.”

“Ya’kint make muh,” the man said, without looking at Arcolin.

“I won’t try,” Arcolin said. “But I will see you dead before midday if you don’t.” He turned away.

“I’ll die,” the man said.

“Your choice,” Arcolin said over his shoulder.

“Better you than them,” the man said, more softly.

“Them?” Arcolin said, turning back.

The man spat toward the left. “You been here before—you figure it out. How you do it?”

“Kill you? Sword to the neck, how else?”

The man’s brow furrowed. “You do it quick? Even if I don’t tell?”

Arcolin’s memories of the last season in Aarenis rose to choke him. “Yes,” he said.

“You one of them Girdish?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then—go on. Do it now. I got nothing to think about and nothing to live for.”

Arcolin looked at him a long moment, but the man stared past him, unresponsive again. He drew his sword, aware of many watching eyes—the veterans of the last trip to the south in particular.

“This man has chosen to die,” he said, loud enough to be heard. “He wants a quick death, and I have promised it. Gird’s grace on him, Tir’s honor for his courage, and the High Lord forgive what he has done and tried to do.” He stepped to one side; the man continued to stare ahead. One swing of his sword and it was done; blood spurted and the man’s head fell forward. “I’m sorry,” Arcolin said softly to the man’s departing spirit.

“What should we do with him, sir?” Stammel asked.

“Bury him,” Arcolin said. “Let his fellows find that we gave him that much honor.”

“Very good, sir.”

The soil was deep and soft; it didn’t take long to dig a grave, and they rolled him into it and covered it over before the others returned. The injured horse plodded along, barely at a foot-pace. “It’s the numbweed,” the surgeon said. “It’ll wear off by sunset. Wasn’t as bad as it looked, barely into the meat. Should heal clean.”

“There was something on the blade,” Arcolin said.

“Worse for men,” the surgeon said. “Would’ve felled you, left you barely moving, easy prey. Horses are bigger; it would take more than you could get on one blade. He’ll be slow today, possibly stumble now and then, no more. Walking will do him good. I’ll look him over again when we stop at noon.”

The cohort moved on, the injured horse tied to the first wagon. Arcolin glanced at Burek, now on a stocky roan. He had the inward expression of a man arguing with himself. Arcolin cleared his throat, and Burek looked up. “We’re not going to make it two villages down the road today,” he said. “We lost two sunhands to that bit of excitement.”

“I’m sorry,” Burek said. “My horse—”

“It wasn’t your horse,” Arcolin said. “We needed to clear that lookout point. Is that the first horse you ever bought yourself?”

“Yes. Well, I bought them both at the same time.” He patted the roan’s neck.

“Our surgeon’s experienced. If he says the horse will live, the horse will live.”

Burek took a long breath. “I believe him, but—horses don’t have choices.”

“I’m not sure,” Arcolin said. “We train them, yes, and we expect them to go where we direct, but they come with minds, and they choose to trust us or not.” He kept scanning the road, the land to either side, checking the scouts for signals. Burek looked aside now, obviously doing the same.

“Where will we camp, then?” he asked.

“We have a reason to be slow,” Arcolin said. “We got one of their spies; they would have more than one. If they go looking for their man, and find all that blood, they may think we have wounded. I think we’ll camp before we reach the next village.”

“Less than a day’s march?”

Arcolin smiled. “We’ll find a nice obvious fallow field. Send a party down to get water, have them talk about wounded men. We should cut their trail there; if they aren’t using the stream for hidden access, I’ll be very surprised. Look at the sky.”

Burek looked up. Clouds had thickened, the early feather-clouds followed by a thicker layer moving from the west. “Rain by morning,” he said.

“And they won’t expect us to move,” Arcolin said. “We make camp early, a good strong barrier, then put the men to rest. Come dark and the rain—well, we’ll see what word we get from those we send down to the stream.”

By midday, the sun was hidden behind the gathering clouds; the light dimmed and haze blurred the line of woods. The ground rose a little to their right, a low hump, and the road curved a little to the left. “The stream turns here,” Arcolin said. “There used to be a wide flattish area—there—” He pointed. “More than one company camped there, years past. You can still see the outline of a ditch.”

A damp gust came from the west, bringing out all the smells of the land. Arcolin turned in the saddle. “The old campground,” he said to Stammel. “Rain’s coming; we’ll stop here and set up before it starts.” He raised his arm; the scouts raised theirs; he signaled them to stay in place for the time being.

By the time the first wisps of rain touched the canvas, the camp was completed: a line of fresh stakes in the old ditch, whose perimeter was too large for one cohort to defend otherwise, an inner perimeter of brush, the jacks trench, the enclosure for the animals. Arcolin had a shelter rigged up for Burek’s horse, poles roofed with brush. The water party returned from the stream to report a beaten trail, hoofmarks and bootmarks both, on both sides.

“There’s a branch off, up a sort of gully. We only went a little way up it; as far as we went, the tracks stayed in it.”

“No reason for that but staying hidden,” Arcolin said. “Thanks, Donag.” Rain pattered again on the tent. “Get some rest now.” He turned to Burek. “If you’ll update the map, I’ll do the perimeter round. Then we should both rest; it may be a very long night.”

Soft curtains of rain blew across the camp as Arcolin made his way to the first sentry’s post. This was no brief shower; it was going to rain for the rest of the day or longer. Though it was only early afternoon, the woods were no more than a dark blur in the distance.

“Think they’ll attack, Captain?”

“Not immediately. When they think rain and darkness have made us careless, probably.”

“I won’t be careless, sir.”

“I know, Seli.” Arcolin grinned at him, and went on to the next post. As he passed the enclosure for the horses and mules, he checked on Burek’s horse; the surgeon was there, feeling around the wound.

“As I hoped,” the surgeon said. “He’s fine—walking won’t hurt him, but he shouldn’t be ridden or do anything fast. I put more numbweed on it; he’ll rest better.”

“I’ll tell Burek,” Arcolin said.

“He’s been here,” the surgeon said. “I just sent him back. First horse, is it?”

“Yes,” Arcolin said, remembering his own first horse. He had cried when Arrow broke a leg in a ditch trap, hurt more by that than by his own broken arm. No horse since had been the same. “The first one’s always the best.”