Ordermaster

XIII

In the darkness before dawn, Kharl used his order-senses check the causeway to the east of the flat-bottomed boat. Using them was necessary, because the boat had been covered with reeds and grass, from which jutted straggly cattails that remained from the fall before. In the mist that covered the marshes bordering the causeway, the concealed boat looked like another marshy hump, one of a number, if the only one in the immediate area. Under the canvas covered with grass and clumps of plants, the fetid mixed odors of marsh and harbor backwaters were almost unbearable.

Kharl swallowed.

“How much longer, ser mage?” asked Dorfal, the young armsman and former crabber, his voice low.

“They’re still a good kay or more south of us,” Kharl whispered back. As he waited with the clammy fog all around him, Kharl wondered, once more, how he’d managed to get himself where he was-sitting in a flat-bottomed boat less than thirty cubits off the causeway, essentially alone. There was a squad of armsmen waiting well to the west of the marsh, but they were out of sight, and too far away to be of much immediate assistance. They were there to protect Kharl once he returned-and to escort him back to the Great House.

How had he gotten into this mess? By the way he had dealt with Guillam, everything else had followed. While it might not have been his fault, not totally, it was certainly his responsibility. More important, if he didn’t support Ghrant, he’d have nothing, and he didn’t want to go back to that.Hiding, not having enough to eat, watching every corner, listening to every sound-no, he’d had enough of that, even if it had only been for a season.

He could only hope the plan he and Hagen had developed would work out.

The plan itself was simple. Kharl and Dorfal waited in the concealed boat, a craft built like a scow, but far smaller, with two hastily mounted winches fore and aft. Cables were attached to the winches. One was anchored-underwater-to a massive boulder at the edge of the causeway. The other, more than ten rods to the west and also underwater, was tied to a huge and ancient stump that barely protruded from the water. Beyond the stump was a low hillock, behind which the armsmen waited. Between the small scow and the trunk was one of the few stretches where the murky swamp water was a good three or four rods in depth. Kharl would make sure that no order or chaos could be sensed by the Hamorian white wizard-or wizards. He and Dorfal would wait until the bulk of the rebel forces passed. Then Dorfal would winch the craft to the causeway, and Kharl would begin to release order from the nails and other small scraps of metal in the pouch at his belt-after he’d thrown or otherwise placed them in the right spots among and behind the rebels. With the winch and cables, the scow would stay where it was supposed to, and could be moved more quietly.

The idea was to push the rebels forward, toward the harbor front, which appeared largely undefended. It was, in fact, scarcely defended at all-except for the dozen or so old cannon that Hagen had taken from the armories. But those cannon were set to rake the end of the causeway with grapeshot. Hagen had also managed to dig out cold-iron powder canisters, the kind that could be closed after each load was measured and set. While there were still risks involved, from what Kharl and seen and sensed, the Hamorian mages weren’t likely to be able to set much of the powder off at any one time. But he’d told Hagen that it was most likely that some of the powder would still be fired by chaos.

“We’re still risking less this way,” the lord-chancellor had replied.

Kharl had wondered, but with the first companies of Casolan’s main force still at least four days away-and that was if dry weather held-Hagen had few enough choices. He didn’t have forces adequate to defend both the Great House and the harbor, and Fergyn’s forces in the north were uncomfortably close to the Great House. Yet, if Hensolas and the rebel lords took and held Valmurl harbor, before all that long the Hamorianswould be pouring arms and aid to the rebels-as well as slipping in the Hamorian forces that would soon make Austra part of Hamor.

Kharl’s “diversion” had two possible favorable outcomes. It either pushed the rebels into the cannon or forced them to stop and regroup. In the second instance, Kharl would need to get back to the concealed boat in some haste and beat a quiet retreat. That was if matters went their way, and Kharl wasn’t all that confident about that, but he didn’t wish to think about what might happen if they didn’t.

Dorfal said nothing, just shifted his weight uneasily, and the scow tilted slightly.

“Someone’s coming … riders …” Kharl murmured. “Two squads … could be more.”

“How far?” “Half a kay, maybe a little less.”

The two waited and listened, and Kharl let his order-senses receive, but he offered no probes, nothing active, as the lancers neared. There was no sense in alerting a white wizard if one accompanied the oncoming forces. Before long he could sense the armsmen marching behind them, several companies, at least. “Quiet now,” he murmured.

Dorfal nodded.

Kharl wasn’t certain how much of the gesture he caught with night vision that had improved dramatically since he had begun to work with order and how much had come directly from his order-senses.

The sound of hoofs on the flat stones of the road in the center of the causeway rose from the faintest hint to semiregular dull clicks. Kharl could only sense a company of lancers, followed by perhaps three companies of armsmen on foot. That was half of what Hagen had expected.

The mage frowned, because he could not sense any other lancers or armsmen-and there was no sign of a white wizard. That would make his task easier, but it also disturbed him. Where were the white wizards? Were the armsmen coming up the causeway from the south some sort of feint? How would Kharl know? How could he? All he could do was wait until the force passed, then decide whether he could carry out his mission.

More than half a glass passed before the last of the foot neared the concealed scow.

“Winch us in, Dorfal, slowly,” Kharl finally whispered.

“Yes, ser.”

So far as Kharl could sense, no one had even looked in their directionacross the ten rods that separated the road from the edge of the causeway. In the misty grayness just before dawn, Kharl slipped from under the canvas flap covered with tannish marsh grass. His boots splashed slightly as he stumbled in the span-deep water at the edge of the causeway. He was wearing the heavy winter grays that he had once used as a ship’s carpenter, because the gray would blend with the morning fog and mist and help in concealing him.

After scrabbling up the yard or so of rip-rap at the edge of the causeway, Kharl studied the area around him. The misty fog was still thick enough that the armsmen to the north and east of Kharl were but indistinct forms. He checked the leather pouch at his belt and began to move toward the rear of the column of armsmen. With no wizards around, he could throw up a sight shield once he got closer-or if the fog began to thin.

He had decided to begin by releasing the order linkages in the nails he carried in the pouch. Metal was easier to handle than were small stones, at least with his level of ability. He’d thought about releasing the order in the nails, then using a sling to throw them; but the moment he finished unlinking the order within anything, the chaos flared out instantaneously, and he couldn’t unlock order from any great distance.

As he eased along the causeway, angling toward the road, Kharl took care that his boots did not skid on the uneven surface that was mossy rock and slime, with occasional patches of honest soil. He couldn’t see or sense anyone to the south, not nearby, although he thought there might be others another two kays or so to the south.

After a tenth of a glass, Kharl was within perhaps fifteen cubits of the stragglers in the rear guard, five or six back, and less than ten to one side. With the sun yet to rise and with mist all around, the carpenter’s grays had so far provided all the concealment Kharl needed.

The voices of the foot carried in the mist and stillness.

“ … don’t have any armsmen at the harbor … what Vuran said …”

“ … got that mage …”

“ … phaw … order-mage … not like a chaos type …”

“ … hope you’re right …”

Kharl’s lips tightened. He still wasn’t close enough. With a muted deep breath, he drew the sight shield around himself and, in the darkness, made his way onto the road, turning northward and closing the gap between him and the stragglers. As he neared the last rank, he decided that such a positionwas unwise, that he needed to move so that he was more toward the middle of the column.

“You in the rear!”

For a moment, Kharl thought that the mounted officer had seen him, but the man was calling to the stragglers in front of Kharl.

“Close it up! Don’t make me keep coming back here, or you’ll not be lying on your backs for a season or so.”

“ … frigging undercaptain …”

“ … just move … don’t want a floggin′ …”

“Keep it close!” ordered the officer, even as his turned his mount back northward.

Kharl eased back to the west side of the road and began to hurry along the shoulder, trying not to breathe hard as he moved past one rank, then another. By the time the mage had caught up to the middle of the second company, the captain or undercaptain had ridden even farther toward the front of the column.

Kharl kept walking, but pulled the first nail from his pouch, letting his order-senses range over it. The linkages in the iron nails were more like clips than hooks, but he had discovered how to unlink whole segments. The nails were small enough, and he was quick enough, that he could handle a nail all at once. He couldn’t have done that with a much larger piece of metal, and that didn’t take into account the fact that his shields wouldn’t have been able to protect him from that much chaos.

Kharl took the nail and threw it. None of the armsmen seemed to hear the faint clink as it landed two ranks ahead of where he stood.

With a deftness he would not have believed possible an eightday earlier, he used his “unclipping” technique to release the order bonds in the first nail. Immediately, intense heat radiated from the nail, but none of the armsmen seemed to notice.

As the last of the order unlinked, Kharl raised his own order shield.

Crumpt! Soil and chaos flared from the nail as it fragmented into an explosive white miasma. Dirt and rock fragments pattered against Kharl’s order shield.

One of the armsmen dropped, and those near him scattered.

Kharl threw another nail, and then unclipped the order bonds.

At the second explosion, the confusion and yells began to mount.

“Cannon! They’re shelling us!”

“How?”

“Magery!”

“ … don’t have any white wizards …”

“ … cannon … somewhere in the marshes!”

Kharl threw another nail, and removed the order.

Crumpt!

He winced as he felt the red-white chaos-void of death sweep over him, but he followed with another nail, and yet another.

Invisible to those around him, Kharl continued to rain forth random destruction for a time yet. When he stopped, he could feel that he was close to his own limits, and the rebel force had split-or he had split it. All the rebel armsmen were moving quickly, but the lancers and the leading foot continued toward the harbor. The latter half or so of the column had turned back southward, heading away from Kharl and past the disguised boat, seemingly not even looking at it.

Kharl had only covered more than twenty rods of the distance back to Dorfal and the boat before it had become a chore just to lift one leg, then the other. He had long since released the order shield, but holding the sight shield had become a major effort. Keeping himself erect and not falling was also becoming harder and harder.

The toe of one boot caught on something, and he sprawled forward. He managed to break his fall, somewhat, with his hands, but he had the feeling he’d slashed one palm on a sharp rock, and his left knee throbbed as he scrambled erect, shambling toward the straggly cattails protruding from marsh-grass-covered canvas. He knew he wasn’t that clumsy, but tiredness and uneven ground could make the strongest man awkward.

His legs were shaking, and his eyes blurring as he clumsily struggled under the canvas flap, and released the sight shield.

Dorfal had to help him into the scow.

“Winch … us … back …”

“All the way?”

“If … you do it slow-like … still might see us … some close …” Each word was an effort.

As Dorfal began to crank the return winch, Kharl could feel the boat moving away from the causeway.

Nothing had gone the way it had been planned. Half the rebels had gone one way, and half the other. As a mixture of whiteness and darknessswirled around him, Kharl thought he heard cannon. Had Hagen been more successful?

He tried to concentrate, to use his senses to find out, but then, a deeper blackness pulled him under, as though he had sunk silently into the marshes through which Dorfal winched the concealed scow.