He scowled. “Don’t look like much.”
“You been somewhere where you could get stuck with a thorn or a splinter?”
“I never had a splinter fester like that. Give me one of them little bottles to put it in.”
“I want you back in the morning. Meantime, find out what that is. Think about did it start when you were off with the Limper.”
He gave me the hard eye. “What’s going on?”
“The Captain’s got you and One-Eye on the suspect list.”
“The Limper thing.”
“Yes. Mainly One-Eye, though. He’s the one acting weird.”
“He is?”
“He’s stopped cheating.”
“Shee-it! You’re right. He hasn’t tried to … His last dumbfuck idea was that freelance raid on the temple of Occupoa. Damn! I’m starting to feel the medicine. We need to tie the little shit down and hypnotize him.”
“That’s an idea.” I considered taking Goblin to the Dark Horse so Silent could work on him but the weather demurred.
The north wind was fierce. The sky grumbled in the distance. The air had an electric feel.
Goblin said, “I’ll go sleep the storm off.” He swiped a long pull of medicine.
“I might prescribe some spirits and a nap for myself.”
* * *
The sky lords engaged in a savage brawl. The door and shutters rattled furiously. Rain slammed the infirmary. Water came in under the door. Major repairs would be needed. Mud-brick walls weather fast once the stucco comes off. And the roof developed leaks.
Still, encouraged by self-medication, I considered visiting the Dark Horse.
The Captain flew inside behind a wild swing of the door. He grabbed hold and strained to force it shut. I went to help.
Hailstones bounded in, some an inch in diameter. They stung.
The Old Man treated himself to an uncharacteristic oath. Then, “What the hell? This isn’t summer weather.”
“Locals say it happens every five years. Goblin started predicting it yesterday.”
“And how did he know?”
“I don’t know, boss. I do think that this isn’t as bad as it can get.”
A jaundiced eye. “It’ll take a month to fix what’s ruined already.”
“You wanted something?”
“Two somethings. A report on Goblin. And treatment for the purple stuff.” He hoisted his right trouser leg. “It came on fast. I had an itch last night. I got this now.”
“Take the pants off.”
He complied. “About Goblin. What was it?”
“I thought a spider bite. When I cleaned it out I found a little black something. Maybe a splinter. Maybe a thorn. He’s going to examine it. Up on the table. Don’t move while the paste is drying. You suffer any dizzy spells lately?”
“Yes. Why?”
“People with the purple all say they did.”
“They get it in town, too?”
“They do. They use this same treatment.”
“That feels good. The itching is gone.”
A savage thunder battle broke out. The building shook. Hailstones pounded the roof. New leaks developed.
The Captain grumbled, “All this, and flash floods to come. Not good. I’ll call One-Eye in. Give him a complete physical. Understood?”
“Am I looking for something?”
“You’ll know it when you see it. If it’s there.”
The air was saturated. The poultice on the Captain’s leg was not drying. He sat up, pressed a finger into the paste. “We’re being inundated with distractions.”
More thunder. Blinding shards of light got in around the shutters. A downpour of legendary violence followed.
* * *
Mud was everywhere. Water concealed the horizontal kind, rippling in the wind. Every structure in the compound had a melted look. Those not included in the recent improvement campaign were no longer habitable.
The wind remained strong but had turned dry. That helped some.
Nobody had been killed, Company or in town. Injuries were few. Property damage was terrible. People worked feverishly to save what they could.
The folk of Aloe insisted that their gods had protected them. They claimed past storms had been much less benign.
One-Eye came back looking like death warmed over. He had left the Third with a pig farmer, unable to travel. He said the Third had been caught in the open during a hailstorm. He had been hammered badly.
The ugly little black man with the filthy black hat got dragged to the infirmary, struggling. He screamed and swore that he did not need to see me.
My shop got rehabilitated right after the mess hall. Priorities.
“Get naked, One-Eye.”
“Croaker? What the hell? No fucking way!”
“Gentlemen, help our brother shed his apparel. Be sure to wash your hands afterward.” One-Eye was not fastidious. He wore clothes till they rotted off, or till he stole something he considered fetching. What he wore now would be dangerously infested.
Candy took that beaten old hat. One-Eye tried to groin-kick him. Candy drove a fist into his gut.
One-Eye screamed like a little girl thrown into a fire. Everything stopped. One-Eye collapsed.
Damn! “Gentlemen, please continue.”
They finished. They took care not to hurt One-Eye any more. He was careful not to provoke anyone else.
Goblin turned up. He might be useful. “Stand by, runt. Candy, I need him on the table.”
The men hoisted One-Eye and stretched him out.
“Gods,” somebody muttered.
Because of One-Eye’s purple legs? Or the smell? Candy’s punch had knocked a crusty bandage off a nasty wound.
“We have to knock him out before I can do anything. Goblin?”
“I got nothing better than you.”
I told him what to bring me, mixed in a sweet fig wine. Meantime, One-Eye got his breath and attitude back. We had to make him drink.
Eventually, Goblin declared, “He’s under.”
“The rest of you guys can go. He’ll be out for hours. He won’t feel like scrapping when he wakes up.”
Candy and crew departed. Somebody wondered why we did not burn One-Eye’s hat and clothes. Entire tribes of creepy-crawlies would be living in there. “Too much,” I said. “Just wash them.”
The Captain turned up. He had mud all over. He had been out working like everybody else. “What have you got, Croaker?”
“The worst case of purple yet. Both legs, ankles to midthigh, all the way around. It’s turning green and gray where it’s been there the longest. He wanted to keep it secret.”
“The original case?”
“That’s my guess. I’m tempted to let him be so I can see the disease’s full course.” I scraped graying mold to see what lay beneath.
“And the belly wound?”
“Like Goblin’s but farther inboard and farther gone. It looks and smells the same. He’ll be a while healing.”
“He didn’t treat himself.”
That was actually a question. One-Eye was my backup as physician. He should have taken better care of himself.
“We’ll ask when he comes around.”
“Deal with him, Croaker. Goblin and I will be in the corner having a word.”
Ouch! Poor Goblin.
I got out more little bottles. I put pus in one and mold scrapings in others. I cleaned One-Eye’s wound. I found another something that looked like a bit of thorn. “Here we go. Same thing.”
The meeting of the minds took a sabbatical. Goblin was grateful. He looked like an eight-year-old saved from having to go cut a switch. The Captain studied One-Eye’s wound. “Can you keep that from going bad?”
“I can. If One-Eye takes care of himself.”
The Captain told Goblin, “If he croaks you go in the same hole he does.” He stalked out.
I looked at Goblin. “Wow.”
“Got pretty intense.”
“Yes?
”
“That man needs to get a sense of humor.”
“He needs a life without hassles like you and One-Eye. He did have a sense of humor, once upon a time.” That won me no love. “You get anything from what I took out of you?”
“It was a spider fang. Venomous. Not a fiddleback. The festering is a diversion. The fang was carrying a spell into my guts. You messed that up when you convinced me that I had gone missing for two days. It went on poisoning me till you took it out, though.”
“That adds up, sort of. Was the spell supposed to make you do something?”
“I don’t know. We can ask One-Eye. He’s had the full effect for a lot longer.”
That was a dim hope. I felt like we were caught in a puppet show.
“Goblin, if you was looking with a neutral eye would you say this was Limper’s style?” Limper was usually a find-a-bigger-hammer kind of problem solver. This seemed too complex.
“How much do we really know about him? Not a lot. But who else stands to profit? Nobody since the Battle at Charm. Unless Whisper…”
Uh-oh.
I harkened back to two people in a forest clearing years ago, where Raven and I ambushed and captured the great Rebel commander of the day, Whisper. Now Taken. Now the Lady’s proconsul in the east.
The other person in that clearing, then, had been a Taken making a turncoat deal. The Limper. Who had suffered terribly for his treason.
Goblin said, “He might be that clever. We don’t know what he hasn’t shown us. We only know that he doesn’t want to do anything the Lady will notice since we got hold of that rescript.”
I grunted. One-Eye was set to go.
Goblin stuck with his theme. “We’ve never proven that the Limper is stupid, only that he’s so powerful he doesn’t need to be smart.”
“Maybe.” But I wondered.
Goblin growled, “Damn it, Croaker! There you go thinking too much again.”
* * *
Days passed. Work proceeded. The Old Man kept just two hundred men in to refurbish the compound. He seemed unusually edgy. He did not get enough sleep. Some men, me included, went to work in town part-time. The rest helped salvage livestock and crops and put fast-growing stuff into the driest ground quickly so that the Company and Aloe alike could avoid a hungry winter.
Goblin kept One-Eye in a healing coma for five days.
In normal times those two squabble like deadly enemies but neither can get by without the other.
I had an epiphany. A teensy one, but an epiphany nonetheless.
One-Eye always started those squabbles. They had not had a serious dustup since the Limper left. That had been overlooked by everyone but the Captain.
Being a rare Company intellectual resource, I indulge in manual labor only when I must. I do not operate shovels or mattocks. I felt for the blacksmiths, armorers, carpenters, and Silent. Silent was draining himself trying to make fields dry faster.
The purple loved the damp. I saw dozens of new cases. We had to hustle to find enough borax.
* * *
I staggered into the Dark Horse after the sixth day of cleanup. I was beyond exhaustion. I might never go back to the compound.
“Croaker?” Zhorab was surprised to see me. He had only one customer, himself. He sat at the bar in the light of one feeble lamp.
“Damn. I didn’t think it would be this dead.”
“Me neither. I thought people would come drown their sorrows. But they’re all being civic-minded. Even me. I finish the day too wore out to come back and pretend. What’ll you have?” He oozed off his stool, eased behind the bar. “Beer, of course. With you guys it’s always beer.”
He drew a flagon. I put a coin down. He pushed it back. “No point.” He topped up his own drink, returned to the customer side of the bar. “I blame you.”
“Me? For what?”
“Not you personally. The Company. For all your energy and determination to make things right. Instead of busting their asses most folks here would rather drown their sorrows while shaking their fists at the gods.”
“The gods help most those who help themselves.”
“Right. I’m telling you, you guys set a bad example.”
“Sorry about that, Markeg. I got to head out before I pass out.”
“Hang on.”
I hung, leaning on the bar, while a man struggled with his conscience.
Markeg Zhorab, barkeep, had been something else, once upon a time. He was a big man with a lot of scars. His yesterday and today were conflicted.
He had something to tell me. He would give it up, gently, voluntarily, now, or later to men who would not be polite when they asked.
“You people have been good to me, Croaker. You’ve been good to Aloe. You’ve been good for Aloe.”
“That’s what we do. We’re peacemakers. Bringers of order. Prosperity follows us.” Sarcasm? From me?
“Some don’t see that. Some don’t want to see that.”
“Uhm?”
“They’re stirring trouble because you arrested that temple girl.”
“Really?” I had been surprised at the lack of outrage then. The girl had had no family. Indignation focused on our intrusion into a temple.
Zhorab said, “They want me to spy on you guys.”
“Go ahead. If that helps keep you safe.”
“Damn! You won’t force me to be a double agent?”
Yes, Zhorab would be a double agent. But he would not know it. Every word he heard from now on would be designed for Rebel ears.
“We aren’t worried. Anyone who looks can see what we’re doing and why. The system goes back forever. It works.”
Did I believe that? Some. Mostly I do not worry about that stuff.
Zhorag decided. “There’s something else.”
* * *
“Bring me some sticks to hold my eyes open,” I told Silent. “I’m surprised I stayed awake long enough to make it back.” I exaggerated. Operating without sleep is a necessary skill for a soldier.
One-Eye was awake, more or less, shading toward less. I was standing by in case the little shit got overexcited.
I had told the Captain about my visit with Zhorab.
His one comment was, “We’re on our own.” Then he told me to watch One-Eye. I got the feeling that he considered my news good.
Silent and Goblin wanted to put One-Eye to sleep, but hypnotized. Silent had tried with Goblin before, with unsatisfactory results. They had better hopes for One-Eye.
Goblin whispered, “What was that with the Captain?”
“I came up with confirmation that the weird shit going on is all aimed at us. And we’ll be on our own, dealing with it.”
He pricked One-Eye with a pin. One-Eye did not respond. “Meaning?”
“Whisper could be involved. Limper, too. A Rebel called Cannon Shear has orders to wipe us out. He’s actually been on the job since last fall. And he’s Whisper’s cousin, which might interest them back at the Tower.”
“You came up with all that where?”
“In town. Some folks hear all the scuttlebutt.”
“Grain of salt?”
“A bucket of salt. But think about this. Where did you go for two days? What did you bring back? Limper was multitasking when he was here. He was following the Lady’s orders, yeah, but he was working on us, too. He fixed you and One-Eye so we can’t report through you. He’d know if we tried. Right?”
Goblin tested One-Eye’s. “Maybe.”
“Suppose his main reason for taking you off somewhere was so the rest of us wouldn’t trust you anymore. We’d have to honor the threat. But, considering One-Eye, there’d have to be more.” If Company hygiene matched the Limper’s abysmal standards the purple would have crippled us all.
“I see. I can’t yell for Mommy, we can’t go through Whisper’s headquarters, and we can’t get a courier through to the Tower. You set, Silent?”
Silent nodded.
I said, “I think Whisper and Limper mean
t Cannon Shear to be their revenge. They wouldn’t need to do anything but claim ignorance because we never asked for help. After they eliminate Shear.”
“That would mean Whisper is it in deep. One fly in your ointment, Croaker. That rescript. Limper will want it back, bad. It could take him down. One-Eye. Sweetheart. Wake up. You’ve just enjoyed a wonderful night’s sleep.”
I had tucked one copy of that damning rescript into the shirt of Tides Elba before Limper took her back to the Tower. The Lady might be watching him already. But I dared not mention that while Goblin and One-Eye were suspect.
I said, “Cannon Shear is headed our way. Originally, he was supposed to hit us while we were scattered and confused by the storm.”
The Rebel had expected the bad weather but that had crippled them, too. They were more than a week behind schedule.
Goblin and Silent signed for silence. Who knew what ears might be listening?
Shear’s force had not assembled where and when it should have. Zhorab did not know why. He said there was confusion in the underground.
Unexpected shit will screw the bad guys, too.
One-Eye’s eye was open. He appeared rested, relaxed, amused, and ready to talk. His answers, though, were no more useful than Goblin’s.
Goblin kept after him from various angles. It did no good.
Goblin said, “More effort went into him than into me.”
“Might have to do with perceived character. Maybe we should keep him under.”
Silent signed something about the Third.
Goblin nodded, started whispering about spiders. One-Eye had no use for eight-leggers except to deploy them as an affliction upon someone else. Goblin signed to Silent, told me, “Let’s go outside.”
It was dark, the sky was clear, moonless, stars in a flood beyond calculation. Goblin whispered, “One-Eye will sense that I’m not there to protect him.”
So. Silent would do something with imaginary spiders, going for a backside breakthrough.
“We’re past where we might need you, Croaker. Go make love to your cot.”
The Captain said, “Not so fast.” Great. He was back and determined that I should never sleep again.
“Sir?”
“Any headway with One-Eye?”
Goblin said, “No. We were about to…”