The Many Deaths of the Black Company

  56

  The Nether Taglian Territories: The Manor at Gharhawnes

  Ten days into the Amble on the Viliwash we had traveled barely forty-five miles. A third of those we covered in a single day when it became apparent, to the amazement of all, that there really were people in the Taglian Territories disinclined to celebrate liberation from the Protector’s reign. A coalition of regional nobles and priests tried to resist, then tried to hole up in a stout manor called Gharhawnes. In the field Tobo used his talents to weaken their will to resist, before the soldiers got a real chance to beat up on them.

  We surrounded the manor at dusk. Fires sprouted. The outer wall of the manor house seemed to boil with a dark mist as the Unknown Shadows stormed the place.

  Results did not become obvious for hours. Tobo’s friends preferred to be indirect. And preferred the cover of darkness.

  We had the place surrounded. Our bonfires sent harmless shadows scampering over the manor walls. I told Sleepy, “This place looks nice and comfy, Captain. We’re in no hurry. We could hang around here for a while. Long enough to learn its name.”

  She was underwhelmed by the suggestion. “Gharhawnes.”

  “Bless you.”

  “Gharhawnes is the name of the place, you idiot.”

  “And it’s the best place we’ve seen. Maybe we should set up the prince and his sister here. Sort of get them back into the swing of being royalty.” The gods knew they got no practice with us savages. We just dragged them hither and yon like so much duffel, in case they became useful someday.

  “Don’t you have some writing to do? Or a boil to lance?”

  “Not at the moment. I’m all yours and full of advice.”

  Before she could put together a suitable reply without using profanity, a party of several men slipped out of the manor, bringing women and children with them.

  I had a feeling our camp looked pretty impressive.

  It was supposed to look like a horde was on the move.

  Tobo and his parents materialized. The boy said, “The haunts are working faster than I thought they would.” He extended an arm, hand palm downward, then whispered in what sounded like the language of Hsien. A moment later a cry of rage came from a high manor window where a pair of archers had been about to snipe at the defectors. One somehow managed to fall through the opening.

  The Captain said, “Have those things start whispering that anyone who surrenders before dawn will be allowed to take their possessions with them. They’ll even be allowed to go home unharmed if they take an oath to the Prahbrindrah Drah. Captives taken after sunrise tomorrow will be conscripted into our forced labor battalions.”

  We did not have forced labor battalions. But those were a part of siege warfare and were often the fate of prisoners of war and peasants who were insufficiently fleet of foot. The threat was plausible. And the Black Company had a long reputation for being unimpressed by caste, noble birth, or priestly status, too.

  Once it was clear we would provide covering fire to defectors a flow developed. Usually the soldiers set to keep deserters from using the posterns were the first to come over.

  The people engineering the resistance were not popular with their conscripted followers.

  So some folks wanted to see the Protectorate continue but the people who had to do the work were not interested. The few I got to talk to had no real convictions in the matter. Who ruled made little difference in their lives. But it was getting on toward harvest time.

  One of the great truths was getting some exposure to the light here.

  Our men entered the manor early next morning. I was still asleep. Tobo’s pets spread confusion. Our men cleaned up behind them. None of our people died. There were few wounds of any consequence. Sleepy felt magnanimous. She turned most of the men of standing over to the Radisha and her brother for judgment. Only those Tobo identified as irredeemable creatures of the Protector faced the Company justice.

  “Spread that around,” Sleepy told Tobo. “Make it sound a lot bigger than it was.”

  “Tonight little people will be whispering in the ears of sleepers everywhere within two hundred miles.”

  57

  The Nether Taglian Territories: The Resurrection

  That far Taglian province shared religions with the rest of the Taglian Territories, with the majority being Gunni. It’s language was closely akin to that spoken around Dejagore. Sleepy could manage the dialect with only a little practice.

  What I called a manor house was really more like a village completely enclosed within a single blockish structure. The principal building material was an unbaked brick kept carefully plastered so it would not wash away in the rain. Inside there was an open central square with both cisterns and a good well. Stables and workshops opened on it all around. The rest of the structure was a warren of halls and rooms where people obviously lived and worked and ran shops and lived life as though the place was indeed some sort of city.

  “It’s a termite mound,” Murgen told me.

  “The Prince and his sis ought to feel right at home. It’s as bad as the Taglian Palace. On a miniature scale.”

  “I want to know what they ate. The smell is overpowering.” The odors of spices clogged every hallway. But that was true in every Taglian city and town. These odors were just an alien mix.

  Thai Dei caught up. He had actually allowed Murgen out of his sight for several minutes. Maybe he was slowing down, too. He brought a message. “Tobo says to tell you that Sleepy has decided to take a chance on wakening the Howler.”

  You could tell Thai Dei was worried because that was one of the longest speeches I ever heard the man make.

  * * *

  Sleepy chose to undertake the awakening with full pomp, ceremony and drama. Following an evening meal we gathered in what had been a temple hall, when everyone was rested, well fed and supposedly relaxed. The place of worship was poorly lit and boasted far too many multiheaded and multiarmed idols in its corners to lead me to consider it strictly benign.

  None of the idols represented Khadi but all Gunni deities make me uncomfortable.

  I was present in a demigod role myself. I appeared as the creepy armored monster Widowmaker. I do not enjoy the role.

  My dearly beloved, on the other hand, just loves any excuse to assume the guise of Lifetaker. For a few hours she can wear the ugly armor and pretend that these are still the good old days when she was something much more wicked than this Lifetaker thing is supposed to be now.

  Our role in the proceeding was to sit there in the gloom with colorful worms of sorcery slithering over us. We were supposed to look intimidating while others got the real work done.

  Tobo just came as Tobo. Hell, he did not bother putting on a clean shirt and trousers. But he did bring his Voroshk students.

  The rest of the audience consisted of senior officers and regional notables who had come in, mainly, to assess the Prahbrindrah Drah and to discover what they would need to do to weather our presence.

  Conquerers do come and go.

  The hall was crowded. All those bodies produced a lot of heat. And I was inside that armor, sitting motionless on a stool behind the action, One-Eye’s black spear held upright in my right hand. That was supposed to be my entire part.

  It mostly involved not fainting in front of witnesses.

  Sleepy had set the stage pretty well, with the low lighting and enough advance rumormongering to make the audience understand that the Howler was both foaming-mouth mad and yet a sorcerer who was as powerful as the Protector.

  Poor Howler. Despite his part in the Shadowmaster wars he was almost forgotten now.

  The Voroshk, I noted, eventually settled right up front. Tobo was treating them as good friends, particularly the well-rounded, freckled little blonde. He chattered with her until Sleepy growled and told him to get on with it.

  Even I felt a little let down by the awakening. Tobo indulged in no mumbo jumbo and no showmanship. He felt that his part was no more exciting
than working in a stable.

  But his effort was more impressive to thoughtful minds. A few people, maybe the right people, understood that Tobo was so good he could make something big look routine.

  I thought the boy’s efforts said a lot about his character, too. His ego did not need a lot of feeding.

  I noted that three out of four Voroshk got it right away. Gromovol actually got it, too, but he did have an ego disease.

  Tobo freed Howler from his long trance in a matter of minutes.

  I do not know the whole story. You never do with their kind of people. But I do know that Howler is ages older even than Lady. He was one of the men who helped her first husband, the Dominator, build the Domination, an empire that collapsed into the northern dust about the time the original Black Company crossed over from Khatovar. Howler’s pain and deformity are a legacy of that time. So is the kind of thinking that led Soulcatcher to proclaim herself Protector.

  The woman does not have the obsessive focus and drive necessary to create a true replica of that old empire of darkness.

  I never have seen Howler outside the layered rags he wears, rags so long unchanged that a whole ecology has developed between the Howler’s skin and the surrounding world. It includes numerous invertebrates, molds, mildews and a variety of small green plants.

  The Howler is smaller than Goblin or One-Eye ever were but Lady insists that that was not always the case.

  * * *

  When Tobo finished, the almost shapeless little ragbag sucked in a deep breath, then let out one of the shrieks that had given him his name. It seemed an egalitarian mix of agony and despair. I shivered despite the heat. It had been a long time since I had heard one of those cries. I could have waited a lot longer to hear this one.

  The little wizard sat up.

  Swords made metallic sounds. Spearheads dropped. Several of the half dozen existing, new-production fireball projectors swung to point Howler’s way.

  But he did nothing more. He was at least as disoriented as the worst of the rest of us when he awakened.

  Tobo signalled. A man stepped forward with a pitcher of water. Howler would be fiercely thirsty. He would drink as much as he was allowed for the next couple of days. The first few of us to be awakened four years ago had made ourselves sick drinking too much water.

  We learned to ration.

  Howler wanted water by the gallon, too.

  He did not get it.

  He opened his mouth. A terrible howl came out. He could not control that frightful habit.

  As rationality returned the little wizard looked around and was not pleased with his situation. He did not recognize anyone immediately. He asked, “How long has it been?” He used a tongue of the north so ancient no one but Lady spoke it. She translated into the language of Hsien, adding, “Right now he thinks he’s been resurrected into a whole new age.”

  I suggested, “Break his heart fast. We don’t have time to waste.”

  Howler asked questions again, in a series of languages, trying to elicit an understandable response.

  I watched him wilt as he began to acknowledge the possibility that he had been asleep so long that the nations of his own age had been forgotten. But he was not entirely numb mentally. Though they differed in detail from the originals he soon recognized the armor Lady and I wore. And recalled who was who. He addressed himself to Lifetaker. The language he chose was an old one that they had shared in another age. There had been a time when I could read it, written, but could only guess at the meaning of the spoken words.

  Just when everyone started to relax he let rip another bone-chilling shriek.

  Lady announced, “Howler sees the general situation. Once he’s had a little more explained I think he’ll be amenable to an alliance.”

  I used the language of Hsien to respond. “Howler has been part of my life most of my life. And all that time he’s been one of the people trying to kill me. I don’t think I can be real comfortable having him on my side.”

  “Well, that would be stupid, wouldn’t it? We don’t have to trust him, darling. The Unknown Shadows will keep him trustworthy.”

  Of course. “And you do remember his true name. Which you could pass along to Tobo.”

  “If I have to.”

  I nodded, thinking it might be a damned good idea for her to tell Tobo right away. Because the Howler was not the sort to be shy, reluctant or slow about eliminating a threat.

  Howler let rip another terrible cry.

  Sleepy had begun to simmer because she did not know what was going on.

  Lady talked to the Howler about our situation while I told the Captain what was going on.

  The Howler howled. There was some passion in this cry. He did not like the situation at all. But he had been there before and my sweetie was amply blunt in making it clear that there would be only one other choice available.

  One reason the Howler had become the Howler was his powerful aversion to death. Nor did he have any reason to love Soulcatcher, who had buried him in a hope that that would last forever. And who had played him cruelly a time or two farther in the past.

  The little sorcerer howled again.

  In the language of Hsien I wondered aloud, “Tobo, do you think Shivetya has the power to cure this little shit’s screaming?” It really got distracting after a while.

  Tobo shrugged. “Possibly.” He was not paying much attention. “I can find out.” He was trying to hear what Riverwalker was whispering to Sleepy. Riverwalker had been called away a few minutes earlier. He was back now with Suvrin and a cavalry officer named Tea Nung. Nung’s troop was supposed to have picket duty so I supposed something important had happened out there.

  Sleepy nodded, said something affirmative. Riverwalker, Suvrin and Tea Nung withdrew. Sleepy started to snap something at them but whatever the thought was, it had come too late. Sleepy shifted her attention back to the matter at hand. She seemed less than totally focused now. She had developed a case of the fidgets. And she seemed to have brightened up.

  She leaned over to confide something to Sahra.

  Sahra was startled. Then she became smiley and conspiratorial, possibly even teasing.

  The Captain did appear to be embarrassed.

  Lady coughed indiscretely to cue me that it was Widowmaker’s turn to speak to our leader. So I said, “Captain, the Howler would be honored to throw in his lot with the Black Company. He’ll create flying carpets for us and he’ll help with our weapons program. I wouldn’t trust him a whole hell of a lot, though. And I’d keep him away from the Voroshk.” All this stated in the language of Hsien, so the little sorcerer would not follow.

  The youngsters remained in their unhappy clump, trying to understand. Almost perky little Shukrat understood enough Taglian already to keep her companions accurately posted as to what got said in that language.

  Riverwalker and Suvrin returned. A tall, handsome man accompanied them. He was dusty and obviously exhausted but he was alert. He ran an inquisitive eye over everyone. He seemed to recognize several people. He even bowed slightly to the Radisha.

  Sleepy rose to greet him. There was a deference in her manner I had not seen before, though it was so subtle as to lurk on the border of imagination. Obviously this was someone she knew. But not someone she cared to announce. After a tentative clasping of hands she, Sahra, Riverwalker and a few others, including the Radisha, slipped away.

  I wondered immediately if they had not done something stupid by bringing the man into a crowded hall when a meeting with him needed to be private. Yet a glance around showed me nobody buzzing. Excepting Sleepy’s cronies from her years underground in Taglios.

  Might the visitor be some Company brother who had been left behind? Or some past ally?

  The glance around also showed me all the Gunni idols apparently stirring. That had begun to divert the attention of the audience. Tobo was grim with concentration. He had his spectral allies hard at work.

  That pretty boy had to be somebody special.


  A moment later Widowmaker moved for the first time during the festivities. He stood up suddenly. The tip of his spear snapped down, pricked the rags surrounding the Howler, who had managed to stifle his screams and was in the process of beginning to ooze away.

  Lifetaker’s great black sword fell an instant later, blocking his line of sight.

  58

  Gharhawnes: The Traitor General

  It was deep in the night when a limping Runmust Singh dragged me out of bed. Out of a real bed. It had been ages. And this one came with a real woman in it. Runmust insisted that she had to get up, too. The Captain wanted us both.

  Lady was grumbling something about restructuring the chain of command when we left our cubicle. We ran into Murgen right away. He was waiting for Thai Dei, who had not gotten a personalized wake up call. Sahra was nowhere in sight.

  I asked, “When are you two going to work it out so you can go your own ways?” Thai Dei was one of very few Nyueng Bao still dedicating himself to bodyguarding.

  “I don’t think that’ll happen,” Murgen said. “He doesn’t have anything else since Narayan died.”

  “Ah.” Thai Dei’s son had been slain by Stranglers. Thai Dei was another who had been waiting in line to get some paybacks.

  The obligation to protect Murgen had become a convenient fiction for both men. I should have recognized that a long time ago. I who have made such a big deal out of brotherhood for so many years.

  Thai Dei bustled up. We set off after Runmust. I said, “Singh, you should let me take a look at that leg. It should’ve healed faster than it has.”

  “It’ll mend fine once I get some real rest, sir. And I believe we expect to stay here for some time.”

  What good would that do if the man refused to take the opportunity to rest?

  I could have Tobo knock him into a coma.

  Runmust led us to a room barely big enough to fit a dozen people. Sleepy and Suvrin, the Prahbrindrah Drah and his sister, Tobo and Sahra were there already. So was the handsome stranger.