Then the vacuum at the heart of the storm enveloped us. Everything froze in the form it had at the last instant. Nothing moved. Tracker and Toadkiller Dog were down on the ground, thrown there after impact. One-Eye and Goblin faced one another, in the first phase of letting their feud go beyond its customary gamesmanship. The other windwhales lay nearby, not visibly affected. A manta plunged out of the color above, crashed.
That stasis lasted maybe three minutes. In the stillness sanity returned. Then the change storm began to collapse.
The devolution of the storm was slower than its growth. But saner, too. We suffered it for several hours. And then it was done. And our sole casualty was the one manta that had crashed. But damn, was it ever a shaking experience.
“Damn lucky,” I told the others, as we inventoried our possessions. “Lucky we weren’t all killed.”
“No luck to it, Croaker,” One-Eye replied. “The moment these monsters saw a storm coming they headed for safe ground. A place where there would be nothing that could kill us. Or them.”
Goblin nodded. They were doing a lot of agreeing lately. But we all recalled how close they had come to murder.
I asked, “What did I look like? I didn’t feel any change, except a sort of nervous turmoil. Like being drunk, drugged, and half-crazy all at the same time.”
“Looked like Croaker to me,” One-Eye said. “Only twice as ugly.”
“And dull,” Goblin added. “You made the most inspiring speech about the glories the Black Company won during the campaign against Chew.”
I laughed. “Come on.”
“Really. You were just Croaker. Maybe those amulets are good for something.”
Tracker was going over his weaponry. Toadkiller Dog was napping near his feet. I pointed. One-Eye signed, “Didn’t see.”
Goblin signed, “He grew up and got claws.”
They did not seem concerned. I decided I should not be. After all, the whale lice were the nastiest thing after the mutt.
The windwhales remained grounded, for the sun was rising. Their backs assumed the dun color of the earth, complete with sage-colored patches, and we waited for the night. The mantas nested down on the other four whales. None came near us. You get the feeling humans make them uncomfortable.
Chapter Twenty-Four: THE WIDE WORLD
They never tell me anything. But I should complain? Secrecy is our armor. Need to know. All that crap. In our outfit it is the iron rule of survival.
Our escort was not along just to help us break out of the Plain of Fear. They had their own mission. What I had not been told was that Whisper’s headquarters was to be attacked.
Whisper had no warning. Our companion windwhales dropped away slowly as the edge of the Plain approached. Their mantas dropped with them. They caught favorable winds and pulled ahead. We climbed higher, into the pure shivers and gasp for breaths.
The mantas struck first. In twos and threes they crossed the town at treelop level, loosing their bolts into Whisper’s quarters. Rock and timbers flew like the dust around slamping hooves. Fires broke out.
The monsters of the upper air rolled in behind as soldiers and civilians hit the streets. They unleashed bolls of their own. But the real horror was their tentacles.
The windwhales gorged upon men and animals. They ripped houses and fortifications apart. They yanked trees out by their roots. And they pounded away at Whisper with their bolls.
The mantas, meantime, rose a thousand feet and plunged again, in their pairs and threes, this time to slrike at Whisper as she responded.
Her response, though it did set a broad patch of one windwhale’s flank gruesomely aglow, pinpointed her for the mantas. They slapped her around good, though she did bring one down.
We passed over, the flash and fires illuminating our monster’s belly. If anyone in the crucible spotted us, I doubt they guessed we were going on. Goblin and One-Eye detected no interest in anything but survival.
It continued as we lost sight of the town. Goblin said they had Whisper on the run, too busy saving her own ass to help her men.
“Glad they never pulled any of this crap on us,” I said.
“It’s a one-shot,” Goblin countered. “Next time they’ll be ready.”
“I’d have thought they’d be now, because of Rust.”
“Maybe Whisper has an ego problem.”
No maybe about it. I had dealt with her. It was her weak spot. She would have made no preparations because she believed we feared her too much. She was, after all, the most brilliant of the Taken.
Our mighty steed ploughed the night, back brushing the stars, body gurgling, chugging, humming. I began to feel optimistic.
At dawn we dropped into a canyon in the Windy Country, another big desert. Unlike the Plain, though, it is normal. A big emptiness where the wind blows all the time. We ate and slept. When night fell we resumed our journey.
We left the desert south of Lords, turned north over the Forest of Cloud, avoiding settlements. Beyond the Forest of Cloud, though, the windwhale descended. And we were on our own.
I wish we could have gone the whole way airborne. But that was as far as Darling and the windwhales were willing to risk. Beyond lay heavily inhabited country. We could not hope to come down and pass the daylight hours unseen. So from there on we would travel the old-fashioned way.
The free city of Roses was about fifteen miles away.
Roses has been free throughout history, a republican plutocracy. Even the Lady did not see fit to buck tradition. One huge battle took place nearby, during the northern campaigns, but the site was of Rebel choosing, not ours. We lost. For several months Roses lost its independence. Then the Lady’s victory at Charm ended Rebel dominion. All in all, though unaligned, Roses is a friend of the Lady.
Crafty bitch.
We hiked. Our journey was an all-day affair. Neither I nor Goblin nor One-Eye were in good shape. Too much loafing. Getting too old.
“This isn’t smart,” I said as we approached a gate in Roses’ pale red walls, toward sunset. “We’ve all been here before. You two should be well-remembered, what with having robbed half the citizens.”
“Robbed?” One-Eye protested. “Who robbed? …”
“Both of you clowns. Selling those damned guaranteed-to-work amulets when we were after Raker.”
Raker was a one-time Rebel general. He had beaten the crap out of the Limper farther north; then the Company, with a little help from Soulcatcher, had sucked him into a trap in Roses. Both Goblin and One-Eye had preyed on the populace. One-Eye was an old hand at that. Back when we were in the south, beyond the Sea of Torments, he had been involved in every shady scheme he could find. Most of his ill-gotten gains he soon lost at cards. He is the world’s worst cardplayer.
You’d think by one-fifty he would learn to count them.
The plan was for us to lay up at some sleazy no-questions-asked inn. Tracker and I would go out next day and buy a wagon and team. Then we would head out the way we had come, pick up what gear we had been unable to carry, and circle the city by heading north.
That was the plan. Goblin and One-Eye did not stick to it.
Rule Number One for a soldier: Stick to the mission. The mission is paramount.
For Goblin and One-Eye all rules are made to be broken. When Tracker and I returned, with Toadkiller Dog loafing along behind, it was late afternoon. We parked. Tracker stood by while I went upstairs.
No Goblin. No One-Eye.
The proprietor told me they had left soon after I had, chattering about finding some women.
My fault. I was in charge. I should have foreseen it. It had been a long, long, long time. I paid for another two nights, just in case. Then I turned animals and wagon over to the holster’s boy, had supper with a silent Tracker, and retreated to our room with several quarts of beer. We shared it, Tracker, me, and Toadkiller Dog.
“You going looking for them?” Tracker asked.
“No. If they haven’t come back in two days or pul
led the roof in on us, we’ll go ahead without them. I don’t want to be seen around them. There’ll be people here who remember them.”
We got pleasantly buzzed. Toadkiller Dog seemed capable of drinking people under the table. Loved his beer, that dog. Actually got up and moved around when he didn’t have to.
Next morning, no Goblin. No One-Eye. But plenty of rumors. We entered the common room late, after the morning crowd and before the noontime rush. The hostler had no other ears to bend.
“You guys hear about the ruckus over in the east end last night?”
I groaned before he got to the meat of it. I knew.
“Yeah. Regular wahoo war party. Fires. Sorcery. Lynch mob. Excitement like this old town hain’t seen since that time they were after that General What’s-it the Lady wanted.”
After he went to pester another customer, I told Tracker, “We’d better get out now.”
“What about Goblin and One-Eye?”
“They can take care of themselves. If they got themselves lynched, tough. I’m not going poking around and getting myself a stretched neck, too. If they got away, they, know the plan. They can catch up.”
“I thought the Black Company didn’t leave its dead behind.”
“We don’t.” I said it, but maintained my determination to let the wizards stew in what juice they had concocted. I did not doubt that they had survived. They had been in trouble before, a thousand times. A good hike might have a salutary effect on their feel for mission discipline.
Meal finished, I informed the proprietor that Tracker and I were departing, but that our companions would keep the room. Then I led a protesting Tracker to the wagon, put him aboard, and when the boy had the hitch ready, headed for the western gate.
It was the long way, through tortuous streets, over a dozen arched bridges spanning canals, but it led away from yesterday’s silliness. As we went I told Tracker how we had tricked Raker into a noose. He appreciated it.
“That was the Company’s trademark,” I concluded. “Get the enemy to do something stupid. We were the best when it came to fighting, but we only fought when nothing else worked.”
“But you were paid to fight.” Things were black-and-white to Tracker. Sometimes I thought he had spent too much time in the woods.
“We were paid for results. If we could do the job without fighting, all the better. What you do is, you study your enemy. Find a weakness, then work on it. Darling is good at that. Though working on the Taken is easier than you would think. They’re all vulnerable through their egos.”
“What about the Lady?”
“I couldn’t say. She doesn’t seem to have a handle. A touch of vanity, but I don’t see how to get hold of it. Maybe through her drive to dominate. By getting her to overextend herself. I don’t know. She’s cautious. And smart. Like when she sucked the Rebel in at Charm. Killed three birds with one stone. Not only did she eliminate the Rebel; she exposed the unreliable among the Taken and squashed the Dominator’s attempt to use them to get free.”
“What about him?”
“He isn’t a problem. He’s probably more vulnerable than the Lady, though. He don’t seem to think. He’s like a bull. So damned strong that’s all he needs. Oh, a little guile, like at Juniper, but mostly just the hammer-strokes type.”
Tracker nodded thoughtfully. “Could be something to what you say.”
Chapter Twenty-Five: THE BARROWLAND
Corbie miscalculated. He forgot that others beside Case were interested in his fate.
When he failed to show for work various places, people came looking for him. They pounded on doors, tapped on windows, and got no response. One tried the door. It was locked. Now there was genuine concern.
Some argued for kicking a break-in up the chain of command, others for moving now. The latter view prevailed. They broke the lock and spread out inside.
They found a place obsessive in its neatness, spartan in its furnishings. The first man upstairs yelped, “Here he is. He’s had a stroke or something.”
The pack crowded into the little upstairs room. Corbie sat at a table on which lay an oilskin packet and a book. “A book!” someone said. “He was weirder than we thought.”
A man touched Corbie’s throat, felt a feeble pulse, noted that Corbie was taking shallow breaths spaced far more widely than those of a man sleeping. “Guess he did have a stroke. Like he was sitting here reading and it hit him.”
“Had an uncle went like that,” someone said. “When I was a kid. Telling us a story and just went white and keeled over.”
“He’s still alive. We better do something. Maybe he’ll be all right.”
A big rush downstairs, men tumbling over men.
Case heard when the group rushed into headquarters. He was on duty. The news put him in a quandary. He had promised Corbie … But he could not run off.
Sweet’s personal interest got the news bucked up the ladder fast. The Colonel came out of his office. He noted Case looking stricken. “You heard. Come along. Let’s have a look. You men. Find the barber. Find the vet.”
Made you reflect on the value of men when the army provided a vet but not a physician.
The day had begun auspiciously, with a clear sky. That was rare. Now it was cloudy. A few raindrops fell, spotting the wooden walks. As Case followed Sweet, and a dozen men followed him, he barely noted the Colonel’s remarks about necessary improvements.
A crowd surrounded Corbie’s place. “Bad news travels fast,” Case said. “Sir.”
“Doesn’t it? Make a hole here, men. Coming through.” He paused inside. “He always this tidy?”
“Yes, sir. He was obsessive about order and doing things by the numbers.”
“I wondered. He stretched the rules a bit with his night walks.”
Case gnawed his lip and wondered if he ought to give the Colonel Corbie’s message. He decided it was not yet time.
“Upstairs?” the Colonel asked one of the men who had found Corbie.
“Yes, sir.”
Case was up the stairs already. He spied Corbie’s oilskin packet, without thinking started to slide it inside his jacket.
“Son.”
Case turned. Sweet stood in the doorway, frowning.
“What are you doing?”
The Colonel was the most intimidating figure Case could imagine. More so than his father, who had been a harsh and exacting man. He did not know how to respond. He stood there shaking.
The Colonel extended a hand. Case handed the packet over. “What were you doing, son?”
“Uh … Sir … One day …”
“Well?” Sweet examined Corbie without touching him. “Well? Out with it.”
“He asked me to deliver a letter for him if anything happened to him. Like he thought his time was running out.
He said it would be in an oilskin packet. On account of the rain and everything. Sir.”
“I see.” The Colonel slipped fingers under Corbie’s chin, lifted. He returned the packet to the table, peeled back one of Corbie’s eyelids. The pupil revealed was a pinprick. “Hmm.” He felt Corbie’s forehead. “Hmm.” He flicked several reflex points with his finger or fist. Corbie did not respond. “Curious. Doesn’t look like a stroke.”
“What else could it be, sir?”
Colonel Sweet straightened. “Maybe you’d know better than I.”
“Sir?”
“You say Corbie expected something.”
“Not exactly. He was afraid something would happen. Talked like he was getting old and his time was running out. Maybe he had something wrong he never told nobody about.”
“Maybe. Ah. Holts.” The horse doctor had arrived. He followed the course the Colonel had, straightened, shrugged.
“Beyond me, Colonel.”
“We’d better move him where we can keep an eye on him. Your job, son,” he told Case. “If he doesn’t come out of it soon, we’ll have to force-feed him.” He poked around the room, checked the titles of the dozen or so books.
“A learned man, Corbie. I thought so. A study in contrasts. I’ve often wondered what he really was.”
Case was nervous for Corbie now. “Sir, I think that way back he was somebody in one of the Jewel Cities, but his luck turned and he joined the army.”
“We’ll talk about it after we move him. Come along.”
Case followed. The Colonel seemed very thoughtful. Maybe he should give him Corbie’s message.
Chapter Twenty-Six: ON THE ROAD
After three days during which Tracker and I returned to our landing place, loaded the wagon, then headed north on the Salient Road, I began to wonder if I had not erred. Still no Goblin or One-Eye.
I need not have been concerned. They caught up near Meystrikt, a fortress in the Salient the Company once held on behalf of the Lady. We were off the road, in some woods, getting ready for supper. We heard a ruckus on the road.
A voice undeniably Goblin’s shouted, “And I insist it’s your fault, you maggot-lipped excuse for fish bait. I’d turn your brain into pudding for getting me into it if you had one.”
“My fault. My fault. Gods! He even lies to himself. I had to talk him into his own idea? Look there, guano breath. Meystrikt is around that hill. They’ll remember us even better than they did in Roses. Now I’m going to ask you once. How do we get through without getting our throats cut?”
After an initial relief I halted my rush toward the road. I told Tracker, “They’re riding. Where do you suppose they got horses?” I tried finding a bright side. “Maybe they got into a game and got away with cheating. If One-Eye let Goblin do it.” One-Eye is as inept at cheating as at games of chance themselves. There are times I think he has a positive death wish.
“You and your damned amulet,” Goblin squeaked. “The Lady can’t find him. That’s great. But neither can we.”
“My amulet? My amulet? Who the hell gave it to him in the first place?”
“Who designed the spell that’s on it now?”
“Who cast it? Tell me that, toad face. Tell me that.”
I moved to the edge of the woods. They had passed already. Tracker joined me. Even Toadkiller Dog came to watch.