The Black Company 16 страница

" Now we wait, " Goblin squeaked, and threw himself down in the tall grass.

" And hope our friends arrive first. " Any nearby Rebel surely would investigate the signal. Yet we had to call for help. We could not penetrate the Rebel cordon unnoticed.

" Get down! " the Lieutenant snapped. The grass was tall enough to conceal a supine figure. " Third squad, take me watch. "

Men grumbled and claimed it was another squad's turn. But they took sentinel positions with that minimal, obligatory complaint. Their mood was bright. Hadn't we lost those: fools back in the hills? What could stop us now?

I made a pillow of my pack and watched cumulus mountains drift over in stately legions. It was a gorgeous, crisp, springlike day.

My gaze dropped to the Tower. My mood darkened. The pace would pick up. The capture of Feather and Journey would spur the Rebel into action. Surrender secrets those two would. There was no way to hide or lie when the Lady asked a question.

I heard a rustle, turned my head, found myself eye to eye with a snake. It wore a human face. I started to yell-then recognized that silly grin.

One-Eye. His ugly mug in miniature, but with both eyes and no floppy hat on top. The snake snickered, winked, slithered across my chest.

" Here they go again, " I murmured, and sat up to watch.

There was a sudden, violent thrashing in the grass. Farther on, Goblin popped up wearing a shit-eating grin. The grass rustled. Animals the size of rabbits trooped past me, carrying chunks of snake in bloody needle teeth. Homemade mongooses, I guessed.

Goblin had anticipated One-Eye again.

One-Eye let out a howl and jumped up cursing. His hat spun around. Smoke poured out of his nostrils. When he yelled fire roared in his mouth.

Goblin capered like a cannibal just before they dish up the long pig. He described circles with his forefingers. Rings of pale orange glimmered in the air. He flipped them at One-Eye. They settled around the little black man. Goblin barked like a seal. The hoops tightened.

One-Eye made weird noises and negated the rings. He made throwing notions with both hands. Brown balls streaked toward Goblin. They exploded, yielding clouds of butterflies that went for Goblin's eyes. Goblin did a backflip, scampered through the grass like a mouse fleeing an owl, popped up with a counterspell.

The air sprouted flowers. Each bloom had a mouth. Each mouth boasted walruslike tusks. The flowers skewered butterfly wings with their tusks, then complacently munched butterfly bodies. Goblin fell over giggling.

One-Eye cussed a literal blue streak, a cerulean banner trailing from his lips. Argent lettering proclaimed his opinion of Goblin.

" Knock it off! " the Lieutenant thundered belatedly. " We don't need you attracting attention. "

" Too late, Lieutenant, " somebody said. " Look down there. "

Soldiers were headed our way. Soldiers wearing red, with the White Rose emblazoned on their tabards. We dropped into the grass like ground squirrels into their holes.

Chatter ran across the hillside. Most threatened One-Eye with dire dooms. A minority included Goblin for having shared in the betraying fireworks.

Trumpets sounded. The Rebel dispersed for an assault on our hill.

The air whined in torment. A shadow flashed over the hilltop, rippling across windblown grass. " Taken, " I murmured, and popped up for the instant needed to spot a flying carpet banking into the valley. " Soulcatcher? " I couldn't be sure. At that distance it could have been any of several Taken.

The carpet dove into massed arrow fire. Lime fog enveloped it, trailed behind it, for a moment recalled the comet which overhung the world. The lime haze scattered resolved into threadlike snippets. A few filaments caught the breeze and drifted our way.

I glanced up. The comet hung on the horizon like a ghost of a god's scimitar. It had been in the sky so long we scarcely noticed it now. I wondered if the Rebel had become equally indifferent. For him it was one of the great portents of impending victory.

Men screamed. The carpet had passed along the Rebel line and now drifted like down on the wind just beyond bowshot. The lime-colored thread was so scattered it was barely visible. The screams came from men who had suffered its touch; Grisly green wounds opened wherever there was contact.

Some thread seemed determined to come our way.

The Lieutenant saw it. " Let's move out, men. Just in case, " He pointed across the wind. The thread would have to drift sideways to catch us.

We hustled maybe three hundred yards. Writhing, the thread crawled on air, coming our way. It was after us. The Taken watched intently, ignoring the Rebel.

" That bastard wants to kill us! " I exploded- Terror turned my legs to gelatin. Why would one of the Taken want us to become victims of an accident?

If that was Catcher... . But Catcher was our mentor. Our boss. We wore his badges. He wouldn't... .

The carpet snapped into motion so violently its rider almost tumbled off. It hurtled toward the nearest wood, vanished. The thread lost volition and drifted down, disappearing in the grass.

" What the devil? "

" Holy Hell! "

I whirled. A vast shadow moved toward us, expanding, as a gigantic carpet descended. Faces peeped over its edges. We froze,, bristling with ready weapons.

" The Howler, " I said, and had my guess confirmed by a cry like that of a wolf challenging the moon.

The carpet grounded. " Get aboard, you idiots. Come on. Move it. "

I laughed, tension draining away. That was the Captain. He danced like a nervous bear along the near edge of the carpet. Others of our brethren accompanied him. I threw my pack aboard, accepted a hand up. " Raven. You showed up in the nick this time. "

" You'll wish we'd let you take your chances. "

" Eh? "

" Captain will tell you. "

The last man scrambled aboard. The Captain gave Feather and Journey the hard eye, then marched around getting the men evenly distributed. At the rear of the carpet, unmoving, shunned, sat a child-sized figure concealed in layers of indigo gauze. It howled at random intervals.

I shuddered. " What are you talking about? "

" Captain will tell you, " he repeated.

" Sure. How's Darling? "

" Doing all right. " Lots of words in our Raven.

The Captain settled beside me. " Bad news, Croaker, " he said.

" Yeah? " I reached for my vaunted sarcasm. " Give it to me straight. I can take it. "

" Tough guy, " Raven observed.

" That's me. Eat nails for breakfast. Whip wildcats with my bare hands. "

The Captain shook his head. " Hang on to that sense of humor. The Lady wants to see you. Personally. "

My stomach dropped to the ground, which was a couple hundred feet down. " Oh, shit, " I whispered. " Oh, damn. "

" Yeah. "

" What did I do? "

" You'd know better than I do. "

My mind hurtled around like a herd of mice fleeing a cat. In seconds I was soaked with sweat.

Raven observed, " Can't be as bad as it sounds. She was almost polite. "

The Captain nodded. " It was a request. "

" Sure it was. "

Raven said, " If she had a grudge you'd just disappear. "

I did not feel reassured.

" One too many romances, " the Captain chided. " Now she's in love with you too. "

They never forget, never let up. It had been months since I had written one of those romances. " What's it about? "

" She didn't say. "

Silence reigned the rest of the way. They sat beside me and tried to reassure me with traditional Company solidarity. As we came in on our encampment, though, the Captain did say, " She told us to bring our strength up to the thousand mark. We can enlist volunteers from the lot we brought out of the north. "

" Good news, good news. " That was cause for jubilation. For the first time in two centuries we were going to grow. Plenty of stragglers would be eager to exchange their oaths to the Taken for oaths to the Company. We were in high favor. We had mana. And, being mercenaries, we got more leeway than anyone else in the Lady's service.

I could not get excited, though. Not with the Lady waiting.

The carpet grounded. Brethren crowded around, anxious to see how we had done. Lies and jocular threats flew.

The Captain said, " You stay aboard, Croaker. Goblin, Silent, One-Eye, you too. " He indicated the prisoners. " Deliver the merchandise. "

As the men slid over the side, Darling came bouncing out of the mob. Raven hollered at her, but of course she could not hear. She scrambled aboard, carrying a doll Raven had carved. It was dressed neatly in clothing of

superb miniature detail. She handed it to me and started flashing finger language.

Raven hollered again. I tried to interrupt, but Darling was intent on telling me about the doll's wardrobe. Some might have thought her retarded, to be so excited about such things at her age. She was not. She had a mind like a razor. She knew what she was doing when she boarded the carpet. She was stealing a chance to fly.

" Honey, " I said, both aloud and with signs, " You've got to get off. We're going... "

Raven yelled in outrage as the Howler lifted off. One-Eye, Goblin, and Silent all glared at him. He howled. The carpet continued to rise.

" Sit down, " I told Darling. She did so, not far from Feather. She forgot the doll, wanted to know about our adventure. I told her. It kept me occupied. She spent more time looking over the side than paying attention to me, yet she missed nothing. When I finished she looked at Feather and Journey with adult pity. She was unconcerned about my appointment with the Lady, though she did give me a reassuring hug good-bye.

The Howler's carpet drifted away from the Tower top. I waved a feeble farewell. Darling blew me a kiss. Goblin patted his breast. I touched the amulet he had given me in Lords. Small comfort, that.

Imperial Guards strapped Journey and Feather onto litters. " What about me? " I asked shakily.

A captain told me, " You're supposed to wait here. " He stayed when the others left. He tried to make small talk, but I wasn't in the mood.

I wandered to the Tower's edge, looked out on the vast engineering project being undertaken by the Lady's armies.

At the time of the Tower's construction huge basalt billets had been imported. Shaped on site, they had been

THE BLACK COMPANY 247

stacked and fused into this gigantic cube of stone. The waste, chips, blocks broken during shaping, billets found unsuitable, and overage, had been left scattered around the Tower in a vast wild jumble more effective than any moat. It extended a mile.

In the north, though, a depressed piece-of-pie section remained unlittered. This constituted the only approach to the Tower on the ground. In that arc the Lady's forces prepared for the Rebel onslaught.

No one down there believed his labor would shape the battle's outcome. The comet was in the sky. But every man worked because labor provided surcease from fear.

The pie-slice rose to either side, meeting the rock jumble. A log palisade spanned the slice's wide end. Our camps lay behind that. Behind the camps was a trench thirty feet deep and thirty wide. A hundred yards nearer the Tower there was another trench, and a hundred yards nearer still, a third, still being dug.

The excavated earth had been transported nearer the Tower and dumped behind a twelve foot log retaining wall spanning the slice. From this elevation men would hurl missiles on an enemy attacking our infantry on ground level.

A hundred yards back stood a second retaining wall, providing another two fathom elevation. The Lady meant to array her forces in three distinct armies, one on each level, and force the Rebel to fight three battles in series.

An earthen pyramid was a building a dozen rods behind the final retaining wall. It was seventy feet high already, its sides sloping about thirty-five degrees.

Obsessive neatness characterized everything. The plain, in places scraped down several feet, was as level as a tabletop. It had been planted with grass. Our animals kept that cropped like a well-kept lawn. Stone roadways ran here and. there, and woe betide the man who strayed off without orders.

Below, on the middle level, bowmen were ranging fire on the ground between the nearer trenches. While they loosed, their officers adjusted the positions of racks from which they drew their arrows.

On the upper terrace Guards bustled around ballistae, calculating fire lanes and survivability, ranging their engines on targets farther away. Carts laden with ammunition sat near each weapon.

Like the grass and mannered roadways, these preparations betrayed an obsession with order.

On the bottom level workmen had begun demolishing short sections of retaining wall. Baffling.

I spotted a carpet coming in, turned to watch. It settled to the roof. Four stiff, shaky, wind-burned soldiers stepped off. A corporal led them away.

The armies of the east were headed our way, hoping to arrive before the Rebel assault, with little hope of actually making it. The Taken were flying day and night bringing in what manpower they could.

Men shouted below. I turned to look... . Threw up an arm. Slam! Impact threw me a dozen feet, spinning. My Guard guide yelled. The Tower roof came up to meet me. Men shouted and ran my way.

I rolled, tried to get up, slipped in a slick of blood. Blood! My blood! It spurted from the inside of my left upper arm. I stared at the wound with dull, amazed eyes. What the hell?

" Lay down, " the Guard captain ordered. " Come on. " He slapped me a good one. " Quick. Tell me what to do. "

" Tourniquet, " I croaked. " Tie something around it. Stop the bleeding. "

He yanked his belt off. Good, quick thinking. One of the best tourniquets there is. I tried to sit up, to advise while he worked.

" Hold him down, " he told several bystanders. " Foster What happened? "

" One of the weapons fell off the upper tier. It went off when it fell. They're running around like chickens. "

" Wasn't no accident, " I gasped. " Somebody wanted to kill me. " Getting hazy, I could think of nothing but lime thread crawling against the wind. " Why? "

" Tell me and we'll both know, friend. You men. Get a litter. " He snugged the belt tighter. " Going to be all right, fellow. We'll have you to a healer in a minute. "

" Severed artery, " I said. " That's tricky. " My ears hummed. The world began to turn slowly, getting cold. Shock. How much blood did I lose? The captain had moved fast enough. Plenty of time. If the healer was not some butcher.... "

The captain grabbed a corporal. " Go find out what happened down there. Don't take any bullshit answers. "

The litter came. They lifted me in, hoisted me, and I passed out. I wakened in a small surgery, tended by a man who was as much sorcerer as surgeon. " Better job than I could have done, " I told him when he finished.

" Any pain? "

" Nope. "

" Going to ache like hell in a while. "

" I know. " How many times had I said the same?

The Guard captain came. " Going all right? "

" Done, " the surgeon replied. To me, " No work. No activity. No sex. You know the drill. "

" I do. Sling? "

He nodded. " We'll bind your arm to your side, too, for a few days. "

The captain was antsy. " Find out what happened? " I asked.

" Not really. The ballista crew couldn't explain. It just got away from them somehow. Maybe you got lucky. " He recalled me saying somebody was trying to kill me.

I touched the amulet Goblin had given me. " Maybe. "

" Hate to do it, " he said. " But I've got to take you for your interview. "

Fear. " What about? "

" You'd know better than I. "

" But I don't. " I had a remote suspicion, but had forced that out of mind.

There seemed to be two Towers, one sheathing the other. The outer was the seat of Empire, manned by the Lady's functionaries. The inner, as intimidating to them as was the whole to us outside, took up a third of the volume and could be entered at only one point. Few ever did so.

The entrance was open when we reached it. There were no guards. I suppose none were needed. I should have been more scared, but was too dopey. The captain said, " I'll wait here. " He had placed me in a wheeled chair, which he rolled through the doorway. I went in with my eyes sealed and heart hammering.

The door chunked shut. The chair rolled a long way, making several turns. I don't know what impelled it. I refused to look. Then it stopped moving. I waited. Nothing happened. Curiosity got the best of me. I blinked.

She stands in the Tower, gazing northward. Her delicate hands are clasped before Her. A breeze steals softly through Her window. It stirs the midnight silk of Her hair. Tear diamonds sparkle on the gentle curve of Her cheek.

My own words, written more than a year before, came back. It was that scene, from that romance, to the least detail. To detail I had imagined but never written. As if that fantasy instant had been ripped from my brain whole and given the breath of life.

I did not believe it for a second, of course. I was in the bowels of the Tower. There were no windows in that grim structure.

She turned. And I saw what every man sees in dreams. Perfection. She did not have to speak for me to know her voice, her speech rhythms, the breathiness between phrases. She did not have to move for me to know her mannerisms, the way she walked, the odd way she would lift her hand to her throat when she laughed. I had known her since adolescence.

In seconds I understood what the old stories meant about her overwhelming presence. The Dominator himself must have swayed in her hot wind.

She rocked me, but did not sweep me away. Though half of me hungered, the remainder recalled my year around Goblin and One-Eye. Where there is sorcery nothing is what it seems. Nice, yes, but sugar candy.

She studied me as intently as I studied her. Finally, " We meet again, " The voice was everything I expected and more. It had humor, too.

" Indeed, " I croaked.

" You're frightened. "

" Of course I am. " Maybe a fool would have denied it. Maybe.

" You were injured. " She drifted closer. I nodded, my heartbeat increasing. " I wouldn't subject you to this if it wasn't important. " .

I nodded again, too shaky to speak, totally baffled. This was the Lady, the villain of the ages, the Shadow animate This was the black widow at the heart of darkness' web, a demi-goddess of evil. What could be important enough for her to take note of the likes of me?

Again, I did have suspicions I would not admit to myself. My moments of critical congress with anyone important were not numerous.

" Someone tried to kill you. Who? "

" I don't know. " Taken on the wind. Lime thread.

" Why? "

" I don't know. "

" You know. Even if you think you don't. " Flint razored through that perfect voice.

I had come expecting the worst, had been taken in by the dream, had let my defenses fall.

The air hummed. A lemon glow formed above her. She moved closer, becoming hazy-except for that face and that yellow. That face expanded, vast, intense, swooping closer. Yellow filled the universe. I saw nothing but the eye... .

The Eye! I remembered the Eye in the Forest of Cloud. I tried to throw my arm across my face. I could not move. I think I screamed. Hell. I know I screamed.

There were questions I did not hear. Answers spooled across my mind, in rainbows of thought, like oil droplets spreading on still, crystal water. I had no more secrets.

No secrets. No thought I'd ever had was hidden.

Terror writhed in me like snakes afraid. I had written those silly romances, true, but I also had my doubts and disgusts. A villain as black as she would destroy me for having seditious thoughts... .

Wrong. She was secure in the strength of her wickedness. She did not need to quash the questions and doubts and fears of her minions. She could laugh at our consciences and moralities.

This was no repeat of our encounter in the forest. I did not lose my memories. I just did not hear her questions. Those could be inferred from my answers about my contacts with the Taken.

She was hunting the something I began to suspect at the Stair of Tear. I had stumbled into as deadly a trap as ever snapped shut; Taken as the one jaw, the Lady as the other.

Darkness. And awakening.

She stands in the Tower, gazing northward... . Tear diamonds sparkle on Her cheek.

A spark of Croaker remained unintimidated. " This is where I came in, "

She faced me, smiled. She stepped over and touched me with the sweetest fingers ever woman possessed.

All fear went away.

All darkness closed in again.

Passageway walls were rolling by when I recovered. The Guard captain was pushing me. " How are you doing? " he asked.

I took stock. " Good enough. Where you taking me now? "

" The front door. She said cut you loose. "

Just like that? Hmm. I touched my wound. Healed. I shook my head. Things like this did not happen to me.

I paused at the place where the ballista had had its mishap. There was nothing to see and no one to question. I descended to the middle level and visited one of the crews excavating there. They had orders to install a cubicle twelve feet wide and eighteen deep. They had no idea why.

I scanned the length of the retaining wall. A dozen such sites were under construction.

The men eyed me intently when I limped into camp. They choked on questions they could not ask, on concern they could not express. Only Darling refused to play the traditional game. She squeezed my hand, gave me a big smile. Her little fingers danced.

She asked the questions machismo forbid the men. " Slow down, " I told her. I was not yet proficient enough to catch everything she signed. Yet her joy communicated itself. I had a big grin on when I became aware that someone was in my way. I looked up. Raven.

" Captain wants you, " he said, He seemed cool.

" Figures. " I signed good-bye, strolled toward headquarters. I felt no urgency. No mere mortal could intimidate me now.

I glanced back. Raven had his arm across Darling's shoulder, proprietary, looking puzzled.

The Captain was off his style. He dispensed with the customary growling. One-Eye was the only third party present, and he, too, was interested in nothing but business.

" We got trouble? " the Captain asked.

" What do you mean? "

" What happened in the hills. No accident, eh? The Lady summons you, and half an hour later one of the Taken goes zuzu. Then there's your accident at the Tower. You're bad hurt and nobody can explain. "

One-Eye observed, " Logic insists a connection. "

The Captain added, " Yesterday we heard you were dying. Today you're fine. Sorcery? "

" Yesterday? " Time had gotten away again. I pushed the tent flap aside, stared at the Tower. " Another night in elf hill. "

" Was it an accident? " One-Eye asked.

" It wasn't accidental. " The Lady hadn't thought so.

" Captain, that jibes. "

The Captain said", " Somebody tried to knife Raven last night. Darling ran him off. "

" Raven? Darling? "

" Something woke her up. She whacked the guy in the head with her doll. Whoever it was got away. "

" Weird. "

" Decidedly, " One-Eye said. " Why would Raven sleep through and a deaf kid wake up? Raven can hear the footfall of a gnat. Smells of sorcery. Cockeyed sorcery. The kid shouldn't have awakened. "

The Captain jumped in. " Raven. You. Taken. The Lady. Murder attempts. An interview in the Tower. You have the answer. Spill it. "

My reluctance showed.

" You told Elmo we should disassociate ourselves from Catcher. How come? Catcher treats us good. What happened when you took out Harden? Spread it around and there wouldn't be any point to killing you. "

Good argument. Only I like to be sure before I shoot my mouth off. " I think there's a plot against the Lady. Soulcatcher and Stormbringer might be involved. " I related details of Harden's fall and Whisper's taking. " Shifter was really upset because they let the Hanged Man die. I don't think the Limper was part of anything. He was set up, and manipulated craftily. The Lady was too. Maybe the Limper and the Hanged Man were her supporters. "

One-Eye looked thoughtful. " You sure Catcher is in on it? "

" I'm not sure of anything. I wouldn't be surprised by anything, either. Ever since Beryl I've thought he was using us. "

The Captain nodded. " Definitely. I told One-Eye to cook up an amulet that'll warn you if one of the Taken gets too close. For what good it'll do. I don't think you'll be bothered again, though. The Rebel is on the move. That'll be everybody's first order of business. "

A chain of logic lightninged to a conclusion. The data was there all the time. It just needed a nudge to drop into place. " I think I know what it's about. The Lady being an usurper. "

One-Eye asked, " One of the boys in the masks wants to do her the way she done her old man? "

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