Water Sleeps

62

I stirred the fat officer with a toe. "Come on. Hop up here. We need to talk. Spiff, let the rest of these people sit up as soon as their weapons are cleared away. I'll probably let them go home in a little while. Goblin, you want to go face the music with Sahra? Get that out of the way so it isn't just waiting for a bad time to blow up on us?"

The fat officer got his feet under him. He looked very, very unhappy, which I could understand. This was not his best day. I took hold of his arm. "Let's you and me take a walk."

"You're a woman."

"Don't let it go to your head. Do you have a name? How about a rank or title?"

He offered a regional name about a paragraph long, filled with the unmanageable clicks that mess up a language otherwise already unfit for the normal human tongue. As proof of my assertion, I offer my inability to manage it at much more than a pidgin level despite having spent years in the area.

I picked out what sounded like it identified his personal place in the genealogy of a nation. "I can call you Suvrin, then?" He winced. I got it after a moment. Suvrin was a diminutive. No doubt he had not been called that by anyone but his mother for twenty years.

Oh, well. I had a sword. He did not.

"Suvrin, you've probably heard rumors to the effect that we're not nice people. I want to put your mind at ease. Everything you've ever heard is true. But this time we're not here to loot and pillage and rape the livestock the way we did last time. We're really just passing through, we hope with minimal dislocation for everybody, both us and you. What I need from you, assuming you'd rather cooperate than lie in a grave being walked on by some replacement who will, is a bit of official assistance aimed at hurrying us on our way. Have I been going too fast for you?"

"No. I speak your language well."

"That's not what I—never mind. Here's what's happening. We're going to go up on the glittering plain—"

"Why?" Pure fear filled his voice. He and his ancestors had lived in terror of the plain since the coming of the Shadowmasters.

I offered a bit of nonsense. "For the same reason the chicken crossed the road. To get to the other side."

Suvrin found that concept so novel he could think of no response.

I continued, "It'll take us a while to get ready. We have to assemble provisions and equipment. We have to scout some things. And not all of our people have arrived yet. I'd just as soon not fight a war at the same time. So I want you to tell me how to avoid that."

Suvrin offered an inarticulate grumble.

"What's that?"

"I never wanted to be in the army. My father's doing. He wanted me away from the family, someplace where I couldn't embarrass him, but he also wanted me doing something he felt to be in keeping with the family dignity. He thought if I was a soldier, there'd be nothing I could mess up. We had no enemies who could embarrass me."

"Stuff happens. Your father should know that. He's lived long enough to have a grown-up son."

"You don't know my father."

"You might be surprised. I've met plenty just like him. Probably some that were way worse. There's nothing new in this world, Suvrin. And that includes all kinds of people. How many more soldiers are there around here? How many all told on this side of the mountains? Do any of them have any special loyalty to Taglios? Will they abandon Taglios if the pass is closed?" The Territories south of the Dandha Presh were vast but weak. Longshadow had exploited them mercilessly for more than a generation, then the Shadowmaster and Kiaulune wars had devastated them.

"Uh... " He wriggled but not hard. Just enough to satisfy his self-image.

We spent the remainder of the day together. Suvrin made the transitions from grudging prisoner to nervous accomplice to helpful ally. He was easily led, overresponding to modest praise and expressions of gratitude. My guess was that he had not had many nice things said to him during his young life. And he was scared to death that I would demolish him the instant he did fail to cooperate.

We sent the rest of the soldiers home as soon as our men stripped the New Town armory. Most of the weapons stored there looked like they had been picked up off old battlefields and treated with contempt ever since by the armorer whose work I had so much admired earlier.

I found the man and drafted him. He was a prima donna, a master with an artist's attitude. I figured One-Eye could tame him.

Suvrin accompanied me when I went across to the farm Sahra had acquired. Poor leader though he was, Suvrin really was in charge of all the armed forces in the Kiaulune region. Which said very little for the quality of his men or for the wisdom and commitment of his superiors. But I decided to keep him handy. He was useful as a symbol, if nothing else.

When I went across I insisted that everyone else make the move, too. I wanted everyone not out on picket duty or patrol in one place so we could respond quickly, in strength, to any threat.

I told Suvrin, "I've neutralized the whole province except for that little fort below the Shadowgate. Right?" That stronghold had sealed its gate. The men inside would not respond to the messenger I sent.

Suvrin nodded. He was having second thoughts, too late.

"Will they leave if you tell them to go?"

"No. They're foreigners. Left by the Great General to keep the road to the Shadowgate closed."

"How many?"

"Fourteen."

"Good soldiers?"

Embarrassed, "Much better than mine." Which might only mean that they could march in step.

"Tell me about their fort. How are they set for water and provisions?"

The fat man hemmed and hawed.

"Suvrin, Suvrin. You have to think about this."

"Uh... "

"You can't get in any deeper than you already are. You can only do your best to get back out. Too many people have seen you cooperating already. I'm sorry, buddy. You're stuck." I fought sliding into the character of Vajra the Naga, seductive as it was. It was so blessedly useful.

Suvrin made a sound suspiciously like a whimper.

"Courage, Cousin Suvrin. We live with it every day. All you can do is put on a death's-head grin and tug on their beards and yank out their tail feathers. Here we go. This looks like the place." A poorly built structure had loomed out of the darkness. Light leaked out through the roof and walls both. I wondered why they bothered. Maybe it was still under construction. I could make out the vague shapes of tents beyond it.

Something stirred on the rooftree as I pulled the door hanging aside so Suvrin could enter. The white crow. A soft chuckle came from the bird. "Sister, sister. Taglios begins to waken." The thing took wing. I watched it fade in the light of a rising fragment of moon. That had been pretty clear.

I shrugged and went inside. I could worry about the white crow next week, once I finally got a chance to go to bed. "Are any of you guys aware that we're at war? That under similar circumstances every army since the dawn of time has put out sentries to watch for people sneaking up?"

Several dozen faces watched me blandly. Goblin asked, "You didn't see anybody?"

"There's nothing out there to see, old man."

"Ah. And you got here alive, too." Which remark left me to understand that there were dire traps out there, held in abeyance only by the alert decision-making of sentries I not only overlooked but whose presence I never suspected.

"All I can say to that is, somebody must have taken a bath sometime since the turn of the century." The same could not be said for most of the crowd inside that shelter. Which might be the reason the roof and walls were so porous. "This is my new friend Suvrin. He was the captain of the local garrison. I blew in his ear and he decided he wanted to help us so we would go away before the Protector shows up and makes life tough for everybody."

Somebody in back said, "You could blow in mine and—ow! What the fuck you hit me for, Willow?"

Vajra the Naga said, "Knock it off. Swan, keep your hands to yourself. Vigan, I don't want to hear your mouth again. You should know better. What've you guys done to get ready to knock over that tower over by the Shadowgate?"

Nobody said a word.

"You guys obviously did something while you were waiting around." I gestured at our surroundings. "You managed to build a house. Badly. Or a barracks. But you didn't do anything else? There're no scouts out? No planning got done? No preparations got made? Was there something going on that I haven't heard about yet?"

Goblin sidled up. In an uncharacteristic tone he murmured, "Don't press these issues. Now isn't the time. Just tell people what to do and send them out to do it."

I trust the little wizard's wisdom occasionally. "Sit down. Here's what we'll do. Dig out whatever fireball launchers we have left. Vigan, pick ten men. Carry the heaviest launcher yourself. The others can carry lighter ones. If there aren't enough to go around, bring bows. We'll go take care of this right now. Vigan, choose your team."

The man who had made the mistake of irritating me rose. In a surly tone he named his helpers. Chances were all of them had irritated him sometime recently. It rolls downhill.

In the few minutes it took Vigan to get ready, I had the others tell me things they thought I ought to know.