CHAPTER 33
Blay barked some order at Nolen and Phedam, and Butu turned back to see Amber staring hard at him. Retus stood to one side, in charge of watching her.
“Corporal, can I talk to you a moment?” Butu heard himself ask.
“Of course, Butu,” Blay said. “Let’s take a little walk.”
Butu obeyed mutely. He sounds like he expected this.
“Why aren’t we all going? That was the plan, wasn’t it?”
“Was, yes, but not anymore,” Blay said with a dismissive wave.
“Why not?”
“Do you think I shouldn’t have sent Jani, or are you wondering why I didn’t send you?” Blay asked.
Butu noted the subject change and understood its meaning. He shrugged and tried to sound nonchalant. “I don’t feel good about her risking her life while I sit safely in camp.” He glanced at Blay, then forced his gaze back to the dunes. “But I think you made the right choice with regards to the three you sent.”
“Thanks,” Blay said drily. “I am in charge, you know.”
Butu went on as if he hadn’t spoken. “Lujo needs to be there in case they meet another clan, because he’s the only one who can change the pommels at a moment’s notice. Magic or no magic, Tirud knows how to handle himself when there’s trouble. Jani is your best scout because you can count on her to get away to tell us what the three of them learn. Of the three, she’s the most likely to get back alive. If you’re going to worry about any of them, I’d worry about Tirud. He’s got no magic to help him escape.”
“Tirud is very resourceful.”
Butu turned around, watching Retus look pained while Amber rambled on about something. She’s a lot like Lujo, that way.
“I still think you should have sent me with them. I can feel people farther away than they can see me, and that might’ve spared us some trouble.”
Blay nodded. “For the same reason, I want you here. They won’t run into patrols, they’ll run into armies. We might run into patrols.”
“That’s not the real reason, though, is it?”
Blay snorted a laugh. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, and you don’t either, do you?”
Butu shrugged. “I’m just trying to see, corp. If I’m not allowed to ask questions, I suppose I’ll just have to guess.” He walked away and went to help Retus.
“... into a trench, you dolt, that carries water to the fields. You don’t think it gets there by itself, do you?” Amber threw her tied hands up in the air.
“Butu,” Retus said faintly, “she won’t be quiet. I don’t want to know about agriculture.”
“Do you know he raised sheep?” she said indignantly. “Do you know what they do to crops?”
“No,” Butu said as Blay caught up to him.
“Butu, you’re in charge of the prisoner. I don’t want her to be out of your sight. Where you go, she goes. When you’re on watch, she’s on watch.”
“Yes, sir,” Butu said tiredly, taking the rope that worked like a leash from Retus, who looked apologetic.
“They eat them! All the way to the roots! You have a sheep near the river, and a month later, you have a river in your backyard. Sheep are vicious, thuggish brutes ...”
The familiar tug of water distracted him from her talk, so Butu followed it, dragging Amber behind him. She let out a squawk and nearly fell.
“Be more careful,” he said. “I don’t think any of us could carry you.”
She bent over to dust sand off her legs. “I’m not going to walk very well with my legs tied like this.”
Butu sighed, looking around. Nolen and Phedam had returned, laughing and with full water skins. Retus strapped a pack with a tent on himself — since the first few days of the march, he had grown the most, and now he lifted the heaviest pack with as much ease as Blay did. Blay called to Butu to come join them as Phedam attached a skin to Retus.
“I should help,” Amber said. “I can carry my own water.”
Blay said she was my charge, Butu thought. I’m responsible if she doesn’t keep up, and I’m responsible if she escapes. So this is my decision, not his.
He knelt down and untied the ropes around her ankles, standing up. She was very close to him, and their eyes were at the same level.
“Thanks,” she said, softly. He stepped back and started toward Blay’s command, earning a squawk from her as he nearly dragged her off her feet.
They marched into the rising sun all morning, stopping for water breaks. Butu didn’t let Amber carry anything. It could all be used to try to escape. Nor did he practice his magic, and, during a whispered conversation with Nolen, he relayed that request to Blay. If she doesn’t see us use magic, she won’t really think that’s why we’re here.
She talked. All the time. About her home on the Riphil, and farming. She didn’t ask any questions of Butu, but if he did speak, she listened so attentively he felt himself telling more than he intended. Blay suggested she be quiet because keeping her mouth open so much would only made her thirsty, and she made comments about his generalized ineffectiveness as a leader that had Nolen and Phedam grinning ferociously behind their hands.
Early in the afternoon, they reached the summit of a particularly tall dune and Retus gave a shout, pointing south.
The first thing Butu saw was a patrol of a dozen men on horses. The second thing he saw, at the very edge of the horizon, was a featureless mountain that looked like it was floating above the shanjin.
“Urgaruna,” Nolen said in awe.
“Zhekara,” Blay said. “Let’s disappear.”
Butu already had bundled Amber partway down the slope before she could cry out for help.
“I won’t cry for help to Zhekara,” she said indignantly. “Shanubu, Butu, don’t you know anything about the political situation?”
“No,” Butu said, somewhat sullenly.
“You should ask your corporal about it sometime. I’ll bet he knows more than he’s letting you know.”
Yeah, right, Butu thought, but he said nothing.