He sat alone for a while, thinking the plan through. Then he rode back to his men.
Premian led his hundred Lancers deep into the red rock country. He was tired, his eyes bloodshot and gritty. The men behind him rode silently in columns of twos; all of them were unshaven, their water rations down by a third. For the fourth time that morning Premian held his arm in the air, and the troops reined in. The young officer, Mikal, rode alongside Premian. 'What do you see, sir?' he asked.
'Nothing. Send a scout to that high ground to the north-east.'
'There is no army facing us,' complained Mikal. 'Why all these precautions?'
'You have your orders. Obey them,' said Premian. The young man reddened and wheeled his horse. Premian had not wanted Mikal on this mission. The boy was young and hot-headed. Worse, he held the Nadir in contempt - even after the fire at the camp. But Gargan had overruled him; he liked Mikal, and saw in him a younger version of himself. Premian knew that the men did not object to the slow advance into enemy territory. The Royal Lancers had all fought Nadir warriors in the past, and in the main were canny men who would sooner suffer discomfort in the saddle than ride unawares into an ambush.
One fact was sure: the man who planned the raid on the camp would not have only one string to his bow. Premian had not ridden these lands before, but he had studied the exquisite maps in the Great Library at Gulgothir, and knew that the area around Temple Stone was rich with hiding-places from which archers could attack his troops or send boulders hurtling down upon them. Under no circumstances would he lead his men headlong into the enemy's arms. Sitting on his mount, he watched as the scout rode to the high ground. The man reached the top and then waved his arm in a circular motion, indicating the way was clear. Premian led his four companies forward once more.
His mouth was dry. Fishing in his saddle-bag, he produced a small silver coin which he put into his mouth to encourage saliva. The men would be watching him, and if he drank then so would they. According to the maps there was no major water supply in this region, though there were several dry river-beds. Often solid digging produced small seeps which would at least give the horses a drink. Or there might be hidden rock tanks of which the cartographers were unaware. Premian kept watch for bees, who never strayed far from water. So far he had seen nothing. Nor had the horses reacted to the shifting of the hot winds; they could scent water from great distances.
Premian summoned his Master Sergeant, Jomil. The man was close to fifty, and a veteran of Nadir campaigns. Heeling his horse alongside Premian he gave a crisp salute. His grizzled face looked even older now, with its two-day growth of silver bristles. 'What do you think?' he asked the man.
'They're close,' answered Jomil. 'I can almost smell them.'
'Lord Larness requires prisoners,' said Premian.'Relay that to the men.'
'A reward would be pleasant,' suggested Jomil.
'There will be one, but do not announce it. I want no recklessness.'
'Ah, but you are a careful man, sir,' Jomil said, with a grin.
Premian smiled. 'That is what I would like my grandchildren to say as I sit with them in the cool of an autumn garden. "He was a careful man."'
'I already have grandchildren,' Jomil told him.
'Probably more than you know.'
'No probably about it, sir.' Jomil returned to his men, passing the word concerning prisoners. Premian lifted the white horsehair-plumed helm from his head and ran his fingers through his sweat-streaked blond hair. Just for a moment the wind felt cool as the sweat evaporated, then the oppressive heat began again. Premian replaced the helm.
Ahead the trail twisted and Temple Stone came into sight. Shaped like a giant bell, it reared up majestically towards the sky. Premian found it an impressive sight, and wished that he had the time to sketch it. The trail steepened towards a crest. Summoning Mikal, he told him to take his company of twenty-five to the crest and wait for the main body to follow. The young man saluted and led his men away to the east, Premian scowled. He was riding too fast - did he not understand that the horses were tired, and that water was scarce ?
Mikal and his men reached the crest - just in time to see a small group of four startled Nadir warriors running for their ponies. The Lord Gargan had said he wanted prisoners, and Mikal could almost hear the words of praise the general would heap upon him. 'A gold raq for the man who captures one!' he shouted, and spurred his mount. The gelding leapt forward. The Nadir scrambled to their mounts and kicked them into a run, sending up clouds of red dust as they galloped down the slope. The ponies were no match for Gothir horses, and it would be a matter of only moments before Mikal and his men reached them. Drawing his sabre, Mikal squinted against the dust and leaned in to the neck of his mount, urging it to greater speed. The Nadir rounded a bend in the trail. . . he could just make them out through the dust-cloud. His horse was at full gallop, his men bunched behind him as he rounded the bend. He saw the Nadir slightly to the left; their horses bunched and jumped, as if over a small fence.
In that terrible moment Mikal saw the chasm yawning before him like the mouth of a giant beast. Throwing himself back in the saddle, he hauled savagely on the reins - but it was too late. The gelding, at full gallop, leapt out over the awesome drop and then tipped headfirst, flinging Mikal from the saddle. He fell screaming towards the distant rocks.
Behind him the Lancers had also dragged on their reins. Seven fell immediately after him, the others milling at the edge of the crevice. Fifteen Nadir warriors, shouting at the tops of their voices, rose from hiding-places in the rocks and ran towards the riders. The startled horses bolted, sending ten more Lancers plunging to their deaths. The remaining eight men jumped from their saddles and turned to fight. Outnumbered and demoralized, with the chasm behind them and nowhere to run, they were hacked down swiftly and mercilessly. Only one Nadir warrior was wounded - his face gashed, the skin of his cheek flapping against his chin. Gathering the Gothir horses, and the helms of the fallen men, they rode swiftly back down the trail.
Premian and his three companies topped the crest moments later. Jomil rode down and found the bodies. Returning to his captain, he made his report. 'All dead, sir. Most of them appear to have ridden over a cliff. Their bodies are scattered on the rocks below. Some good men lost, sir.'
'Good men,' agreed Premian, barely keeping the fury from his voice. 'Led by an officer with the brains of a sick goat.'
'I heard your order to him, sir. You told him to wait. You're not to blame, sir.'
'We'll detour down to the bodies and bury them,' he said. 'How many do you think were in the attacking party?'
'From the tracks, no more than twenty, sir. Some of the Nadir were riding ahead of our boys. They jumped the gorge at a narrow point.'
'So, twenty-six men dead for the loss of how many of the enemy?'
'Some were wounded. There was blood on the ground where they hid their ponies - maybe ten of them.'
Premian gave him a hard look. 'Well, maybe one or two,' Jomil admitted.
It took more than three hours to detour to the foot of the chasm. By the time the Gothir troops reached the bodies it was almost dusk.
The eighteen corpses had all been stripped of armour and weapons, and beheaded.
Chapter Ten
Sieben stood and gazed around at the old storehouse. Niobe and other Nadir women had cleaned it of dust, dirt and ancient cobwebs, and five lanterns had been set in brackets on the walls. Only one was lit now and he used its flickering light to study the layout of this new hospital. Two barrels full of water had been set at the northern end of the large, square room, placed close to the two long tables the Nadir had carried in earlier. Sieben examined the tools set there - an old pair of pliers, three sharp knives, several curved needles of horn and one long straight needle of iron. He found that his hands were trembling. Niobe moved silently alongside him. 'Is this all you need, po-et?' she asked, laying a small box filled with thread upon the table.
'Blankets,' he said. 'We'
ll need blankets. And food bowls.'
'Why for food bowls?' she asked. 'If a wounded man has strength to eat, he has strength to fight.'
'A wounded man loses blood, and therefore strength. Food and water will help rebuild him.'
'Why do you tremble?'
'I have assisted surgeons three times in my life. Once I even stitched a wound in a man's shoulder. But my knowledge of anatomy . . . the human body . . . is severely limited. I do not, for example, know what to do with a deep belly wound.'
'Nothing,' she said, simply. 'A deep belly wound is death.'
'How comforting! I could do with honey. That is good for wounds, especially when mixed with wine; it prevents infection.'
'No bees, po-et. No bees - no honey. But we have some dried lorassium leaves. Good for pain, and for dreams. And some hakka roots to ward off the blue-skin demons.'
'Blue-skin demons? What are they?'
'Truly you know little of wounds. They are the invisible devils who creep in through the open flesh and turn it blue, so it stinks and men die.'
'Gangrene. I see. And what does one do with these hakka roots?'
'We make poultice and lay it over the wound. It smells very bad. The demons avoid it.'
'And what cures do you have, my lady, for trembling hands?' he asked her.
She laughed and slid her hand over his belly and down. 'I have big cure,' she said. Curling her left arm around his neck, she drew down his head and kissed him. He felt the warmth and sweetness of her tongue upon his. Arousal swept through him.
She pulled away. 'Now look at your hands,' she said. They were no longer trembling. 'Big cure, yes?'
'I can offer no argument there,' he said. 'Where can we go?'
'Nowhere. I have much to do. Shi-sai will be in labour soon, and I have promised to help when the waters break. But if you have trembling hands in the night, you may come to me by the north wall.'
Kissing him once more, she spun away from his embrace and walked from the room. Sieben took a last look at the hospital, then blew out the lantern and made his way to the compound. Some work was still being done in the moonlight, repairing the ramparts beside the crack in the west-facing wall. Elsewhere Nadir warriors were sitting around camp-fires. Druss was talking to Talisman and Bartsai on the ramparts above the gates.
Sieben thought of joining them, but realized he did not want to listen to more talk of battles and death. His mind flickered to Niobe. She was unlike any woman he had ever known. When first he had seen her he had thought her to be mildly attractive - certainly no more than that. Up close, her laughing eyes had made him re-appraise her. Even so she would pale against the beauties who had shared his bed. Yet each time he made love to her it seemed her beauty grew. It was uncanny. All his previous lovers were drab by comparison. As he was thinking, two Nadir warriors approached him. One of them spoke to him in Nadir.
'Sorry, lads,' he said, with a nervous smile. 'I don't understand the language.' The taller of the two, a ferocious-looking man with narrow, malevolent eyes, pointed to his companion and said, 'This one have big pain.'
'Big pain,' echoed Sieben.
'You doctor. Fix it.' Sieben glanced down at the second warrior. The man's face was grey, his eyes sunken and his jaws clenched. 'We go in,' muttered the first man, leading his friend into the new hospital. With a sinking heart Sieben followed them and, re-lighting the lantern, he led them to the table. The small warrior tried to tug off his faded crimson shirt, but groaned as he did so. The taller man dragged the garment clear, and in the flickering light Sieben saw a growth on the man's spine the size of a small apple. The area all around it was red, swollen and angry. 'You cut,' said the taller man.
Sieben indicated that the warrior should lie down on the table; then he reached out and, with great care, touched the swelling. The man stiffened, but made no sound. The lump was rock-hard. 'Fetch the lantern,' Sieben ordered the taller man. The warrior did so, and Sieben peered more closely at the growth. Then taking the sharpest of the knives, he drew in a deep breath. He had no idea what the growth was - it looked like a giant boil, but for all he knew it might be a cancer. What was certain was that he had no choice of action, burdened as he was by the expectations of both men. Touching the point of the knife to the lump, he pressed down hard. Thick yellow pus exploded from the cut, and the skin peeled away as if from a section of rotten fruit. The warrior cried out, the sound strangled and inhuman. Laying aside the knife, Sieben gripped the lump and squeezed it. More pus - this time mixed with blood - oozed from the cut, covering his fingers. The wounded man sighed and relaxed on the table. Sieben moved to a water barrel and filled a wooden bowl, cleaning his hands and wrists. Then he returned to the warrior. Fresh blood was oozing from the three-inch cut and flowing down to the wood of the table. With a wet cloth Sieben cleaned the wound, then ordered the man to sit up while he applied a wedge of cloth to it, strapping it in place with a bandage around the man's waist. The patient spoke in Nadir to his companion; then without another word both men walked from the building.
Sieben sat down. 'Not at all, it was my pleasure,' he said, not loud enough to be heard by the departing warriors.
Once more extinguishing the lantern, he left the building by a side door and found himself standing close to the main entrance to the Shrine. With Niobe otherwise occupied, and with nothing else to do, Sieben pushed open the door and stepped inside.
Something about the place had been nagging at him from the subconscious, but he could not bring it to the surface. His eyes were drawn to the blackened iron plate on the stone coffin. The symbols upon it were Chiatze, part alphabet, part hieroglyph, and Talisman had told him what they said:
Oshikai Demon-bane - Lord of War
Kneeling before it, Sieben scanned the symbols. They were deeply engraved into the iron, and they told him nothing. Irritated that he could not solve the problem, he left the Shrine and climbed to the ramparts of the north wall, where he sat on the parapet in the moonlight gazing out over the distant mountains. His thoughts turned once more to Niobe and her beauty, and he listened a while in vain for the birth sounds of the newborn. Be patient, he told himself. Fishing the lon-tsia from his pocket, he looked at the profile of the woman embossed there. She too was beautiful. Turning the coin over, he looked down at the image of Oshikai. 'You're causing a lot of trouble for someone who's been dead for ten centuries,' he said.
Then it hit him . . .
Rising, he climbed down the steps and returned to the Shrine, squatting down before the iron plate. Checking Oshikai's name against the embossing of the lon-tsia, he saw that the name on the plate boasted two extra and identical symbols. Peering more closely, he saw that the engraving of each was deeper than that of the other symbols.
'What have you found?' asked Talisman, from the doorway. The slender Nadir leader moved forward and knelt beside the poet.
'Is this the original plate?' Sieben asked. 'Was it made by Oshikai's followers?'
'I would imagine so,' said Talisman. 'Why?'
'What are these symbols?'
'The Nadir letter i.'
'But the Chiatze had no such letter,' said Sieben. 'Therefore the name-plate is either not original, or it has been altered.'
'I don't understand your point,' said Talisman.
Sieben sat back. 'I don't like mysteries,' he said. 'If this is original there would be no i's. If it is not, why is it in the Chiatze tongue? Why not fully Nadir?'
Moving forward on his knees, Sieben laid his hands on the plate, pressing a finger into each of the engraved symbols. Something gave way under his pressure, there was a dull clunk from within and the name-plate fell clear. Behind it was a shallow niche cut into the coffin, and within this lay a small pouch of hide. Talisman pushed Sieben aside and grabbed the pouch. As he pulled it open the hide split and the contents fell to the dusty floor. There were two knuckle-bones stained with black symbols, a small coil of braided hair and a piece of folded parchment. Talisman looked disappointed. 'I thought
you had found the Eyes of Alchazzar,' he said.
Sieben lifted the parchment and tried to open it, but it broke into pieces under his fingers. 'What are these objects?' he asked.
'A shaman's medicine bag. The knuckle-bones are used in spells of prophecy, the hair is that of the shaman's greatest enemy. The parchment? I do not know.'
'Why would it be placed here?'
'I don't know,' snapped Talisman. Reaching down, Sieben picked up the knuckle-bones.
The world spun. He cried out, but was dragged down into the dark . . .
Shocked by his sudden collapse, Talisman knelt over the still figure of the blond Drenai and placed his index finger on the pulse point of the neck. The heart was beating, but incredibly slowly. Roughly he shook Sieben's shoulders, but there was no response. Rising, he ran from the Shrine. Gorkai was sitting on the ground, sharpening his sword with a whetstone. 'Fetch Nosta Khan and the Drenai axeman,' commanded Talisman, then returned to where Sieben lay.
Druss arrived first. 'What happened?' he asked, kneeling beside his friend.
'We were talking, and he collapsed. Is he subject to fits?'
'No.' Druss swore softly. 'His heart is barely beating.' Talisman glanced at the axeman, and noted the fear on his broad, bearded face. Nosta Khan arrived, and Talisman saw his gimlet eyes fasten to the sagging name-plate on the coffin.
'The Eyes . . . ?' he asked.
'No,' said Talisman, and told him what they had found.
'You fool!' hissed Nosta Khan. 'I should have been summoned.'
'It was just a medicine pouch. There were no jewels,' Talisman responded, feeling his anger rise.
'It is the medicine pouch of a shaman,' snapped Nosta Khan. 'A spell has been placed upon it.'
'I touched it also, and nothing has happened to me,' argued Talisman.
The little shaman knelt beside Sieben, prying open the fingers of his right hand. The knuckle-bones lay there, but now they were white and pure - the black symbols having transferred to the skin of Sieben's palm. 'But the bag split,' said Nosta Khan, 'and it was not you who lifted the Seeing Bones.'