“Freeze. Rebel!” I shouted. “First one moves is dead meat.”
Stupid, Croaker. Real stupid. Their response was swift and gaudy. It damned near killed me.
They vanished in shining clouds. Around Tracker and me insects erupted. More kinds of bugs than I imagined existed, every one interested only in having me for supper.
Toadkiller Dog snarled and snapped.
“Knock it off, you clowns,” I yelled. “It’s me. Croaker.”
“Who’s Croaker?” One-Eye asked Goblin. “You know anybody named Croaker?”
“Yeah. But I don’t think we ought to stop,” Goblin replied, after sticking his head out of the shining to check. “He deserves it.”
“Sure,” One-Eye agreed. “But Tracker is innocent. I can’t fine-tune it enough to get just Croaker.”
The bugs returned to routine bug business. Eating each other, I guess. I constrained my anger and greeted One-Eye and Goblin, both of whom had donned expressions of innocence and contrition. “What you got to say for yourselves, guys? Nice horses. Think the people they belong to will come looking for them?”
“Wait up,” Goblin squawked. “Don’t go accusing us of...”
“I know you guys. Get down off those animals and come eat. We’ll decide what to do with them tomorrow.”
I turned my back on them. Tracker had returned to our cook fire already. He dished up supper. I went to work on it, my temper still frayed. Stupid move, stealing horses. What with the uproar they had caused already … The Lady has agents everywhere. We may not be enemies of the grand sort, but we are what she has. Someone was bound to conclude that the Black Company was back in the north.
I fell asleep contemplating turning back. The least likely direction for hunters to look would be on the route to the Plain of Fear. But I could not give the order. Too much depended on us. Though now my earlier optimism stood in serious jeopardy.
Damned irresponsible clowns.
Way back down the line the Captain, who perished at Juniper, must have felt the same. We all gave him cause.
I braced for a golden dream. I slept restlessly. No dream came. Next morning I packed Goblin and One-Eye into the wagon, beneath all the clutter we deemed necessary for our expedition, abandoned the horses, and took the wagon past Meystrikt. Toadkiller Dog ran point. Tracker strolled along beside. I drove. Under the tucker, Goblin and One-Eye sputtered and grumbled. The garrison at the fort merely asked where we were bound, in such a bored manner I knew they did not care.
These lands had been tamed since last I passed through. This garrison could not conceive of trouble lifting its naughty head.
Relieved, I turned up the road that led to Elm and Oar. And to the Great Forest beyond.
Chapter Twenty-Seven: OAR
“Don’t this weather ever let up?” One-Eye whined. For a week we had slogged northward, had been victimized by daily showers. The roads were bad and promised to get worse. Practicing my Forsbergeron wayside farmers, I learned that this weather had been common for years. It made getting crops to town difficult and, worse, left the grains at risk from disease. There had been an outbreak of the firedance in Oar already, a malady traceable to infected rye. There were a lot of insects, too. Especially mosquitos.
The winters, though abnormal in snow and rainfall, were milder than when we had been stationed here. Mild winters do not augur well for pest control. On the other hand, game species were diminished because they could not forage in the deep snows.
Cycles. Just cycles, the old-timers assured me. The bad winters come around after the Great Comet passes. But even they thought this a cycle among cycles.
Today’s weather is already the most impressive of all time.
“Deal,” Goblin said, and he did not mean cards. That fortress, which the Company took from the Rebel years ago, loomed ahead. The road meanders beneath its scowling walls. I was troubled, as always I was when our path neared an imperial bastion. But there was no need this time. The Lady was so confident of Forsberg that the great fortress stood abandoned. In fact, close up, it looked ragged. Its neighbors were stealing it piece by piece, after the custom of peasants the world over. I expect that is the only return they get on taxes, though they may have to wait generations for the worm to turn.
“Oar tomorrow,” I said as we left the wagon outside an inn a few miles past Deal. “And this time there will be no screwups. Hear?”
One-Eye had the grace to look abashed. But Goblin was ready to argue.
“Keep it up,” I said. “I’ll have Tracker thrash you and tie you up. We aren’t playing games.”
“Life is a game, Croaker,” One-Eye said. “You take it too damned serious.” But he behaved himself, both that night and the next day when we entered Oar.
I found a place well outside areas we frequented before. It catered to small-time traders and travelers. We drew no especial attention. Tracker and I kept a watch on Goblin and One-Eye. They did not seem inclined to play the fool again, though.
Next day I went looking for a smith named Sand. Tracker accompanied me. Goblin and One-Eye stayed behind, constrained by the most terrible threats I could invent.
Sand’s place was easily found. He was a longtime member of his trade, well-known among his peers. We followed directions. They led me through familiar streets. Here the Company had had some adventures.
I discussed them with Tracker as we walked. I noted, “Been a lot of rebuilding since then. We tore the place up good.”
Toadkiller Dog was on point, as often he was of late. He stopped suddenly, looked around suspiciously, took a few tentative steps, sank onto his belly. “Trouble,” Tracker said.
“What kind?” There was nothing obvious to the eye.
“I don’t know. He can’t talk. He’s just doing his watch-out-for-trouble act.”
“Okay. Don’t cost anything to be careful.” We turned into a place that sold and repaired harness and tack. Tracker yakked about needing a saddle for a hunter of large beasts. I stood in the doorway watching the street.
I saw nothing unusual. The normal run of people went about their normal business. But after a while I noted that Sand’s smithy had no custom. That no smithery sounds came forth. He was supposed to supervise a platoon of apprentices and journeymen.
“Hey. Proprietor. Whatever happened to the smith over there? Last time we were here he did us some work. Place looks empty.”
“Grey boys is what happened.” He looked uncomfortable. Grey boys are imperials. The troops in the north wear grey. “Fool didn’t learn back when. Was into the Rebellion.”
“Too bad. He was a good smith. What leads regular folks to get into politics, anyway? People like us, we got trouble enough just trying to make a living.”
“I heard that, brother.” The tackmaker shook his head. “Tell you this. You got smithery needs doing, take your custom elsewhere. The grey boys been hanging around, taking anybody who comes around.”
About then an imperial strolled around the side of the smithy and crossed to a pasty stall. “Damned clumsy,” I said. “And crude.”
The tackmaker looked at me askance. Tracker covered well, drawing him back to business. Not as dumb as he appeared, I noted. Maybe just not socially adept.
Later, after Tracker expressed a desire to think on the deal the tackmaker offered and we departed, Tracker asked, “What now?”
“We could bring up Goblin and One-Eye after dark, use their sleeping spell, go in and see what’s to see. But it don’t seem likely the imperials would leave anything interesting. We could find out what they did with Sand and try to reach him. Or we could go on to the Barrowland.”
“Sounds the safest.”
“On the other hand, we wouldn’t know what we were headed into. Sand’s being taken could mean anything. We better talk it over with the others. Catalog our resources.”
Tracker grunted. “How long before that sutler gets suspicious? The more he thinks about it, the more he’s going to realize we were interested in the
smith.”
“Maybe. I’m not going to sweat it.”
Oar is a city like most of substantial size. Crowded, Filled with distractions. I understood how Goblin and One-Eye had been seduced by Roses. The last major city the Company dared visit was Chimney. Six years ago. Since then it has been all the hard times and small towns you can imagine. I battled temptations of my own. I knew places of interest in Oar.
Tracker kept me on the straight line. I’ve never met a man less interested in the traps which tempt men.
Goblin thought we should put the imperials to sleep, give them the question. One-Eye wanted to get out of town. Their solidarity had perished like frost in the sun.
“Logically,” I said, “they would get a stronger guard after dark. But if we drag you down there now, somebody is sure to recognize you.”
“Then find that old boy who brought the first letter,” Goblin said.
“Good idea. But. Think about it. Assuming he had perfect luck, he’d still be a long way from here. He didn’t catch a ride like we did. No go. We get out. Oar is making me nervous.” Too many temptations, too many chances to be recognized. And just too many people. Isolation had grown on me out there on the Plain.
Goblin wanted to argue. He had heard the north roads were terrible.
“I know,” I countered. “I also know the army is building a new route to the Barrowland. And they’ve pushed its north end far enough so traders are using it.”
No more argument. They wanted out as much as I. Only Tracker now seemed reluctant. He who first thought it best to go.
Chapter Twenty-Eight: TO THE BARROWLAND
Oar’s weather was less than exciting. Farther north it became misery curdled, though the imperial engineers had done their best to make the forest road usable. Much of it was corduroy, of logs trimmed and tarred and laid side by side. In areas where snow became obnoxious, there were frameworks to support canvas coverings.
“Amazing scope.” One-Eye said.
“Uhm.” There was supposed to be zero concern about the Dominator since the Lady’s triumph at Juniper. This seemed a lot of effort to keep a road open.
The new road swung many miles west of the old because the Great Tragic River had shifted its bed and continued doing so. The trip from Oar to the Barrowland was fifteen miles longer. The last forty-five were not wholly finished. We endured some rough going.
We encountered the occasional trader headed south. They all shook their heads and told us we were wasting our time. The fortunes to be had had evaporated. The tribes had hunted the furbearers to extinction.
Tracker had been preoccupied since we left Oar. I could not draw out why. Maybe superstition. The Barrowland remains a great dread to Forsberg’s lower classes. The Dominator is the bogeyman mothers conjure to frighten children. Though he has been gone four hundred years, his stamp remains indelible.
It took a week to cover the final forty-five miles. I was growing time-concerned. We might not get done and home before winter.
We were scarcely out of the forest, into the clearing at the Barrowland. I stopped. “It’s changed.”
Goblin and One-Eye crept up behind me. “Yuck,” Goblin squeaked. “It sure has.”
It seemed almost abandoned. A swamp now, with only the highest points of the Barrowland proper still identifiable. When last we visited, a horde of imperials was clearing, repairing, studying with a relentless clatter and bustle.
Near silence reigned. That bothered me more than the decayed state of the Barrowland. Slow, steady drizzle under deep grey skies. Cold. And no sound.
The corduroy was completed here. We rolled forward. Not till we entered the town, buildings now for the most part paintless and dilapidated, did we see a soul. A voice called, “Halt and state your business.”
I stopped. “Where are you?”
Toadkiller Dog, more than normally ambitious, loped to a derelict structure and sniffed. A grumbling Guard stepped into the drizzle. “Here.”
“Oh. You startled me. Name is Candle. Of Candle, Smith, Smith, Tailor, and Sons. Traders.”
“Yeah? These others?”
“Smith and Tailor inside here. That’s Tracker. He works for us. We’re from Roses. We heard the road north was open again.”
“Now you know better.” He chuckled. I learned that he was in a good humor because of the weather. It was a nice day for the Barrowland.
“What’s the procedure?” I asked. “Where do we put up?”
“Blue Willy is the only place. They’ll be glad for the custom. Get yourself settled. Report to headquarters by tomorrow.”-
“Right. Where is the Blue Willy?”
He told me. I snapped the traces. The wagon rolled. “Seem pretty lax,” I said.
“Where are you going to run?” One-Eye countered. “They know we’re here. There’s only one way out. We don’t play by their book, they stick the stopper in the bottle.”
The place did have that feel.
It also had a feel that went with its weather. Down. Depressing. Smiles were scarce, and those mostly commercial.
The hostler at Blue Willy didn’t ask names, just payment up front. Other traders ignored us, though the fur trade, traditionally, is an Oar monopoly.
Next day a few locals came around to examine our goods. I had loaded up with what I had heard would sell well, but we got few nibbles. Only the liquor drew any offers. I asked how to get in touch with the tribes.
“You wait. They come when they come.”
That done, I went to Guard headquarters. It was unchanged, though the surrounding compound seemed seedier.
The first man I encountered was one I remembered. He was the one with whom I had to do business. “Candle’s the name,” I said. “Of Candle, Smith, Smith, Tailor, and Sons, out of Roses. Traders. I was told to report here.”
He looked at me oddly, like something way back was nagging him. He remembered something. I did not want him worrying it like a cavity in a tooth. He might come up with an answer. “Been some changes since I was here in the army.”
“Going to the dogs,” he grumbled. “The dogs. Worse every day. You think anybody cares? We’re going to rot out here. How many in your party?”
“Four. And one dog.”
Wrong move. He scowled. No sense of humor. “Names?”
“Candle. One Smith. Tailor. Tracker. He works for us. And Toadkiller Dog. Got to call him by his whole name or he gets upset.”
“Funny man, eh?”
“Hey. No offense. But this place needs some sunshine.”
“Yeah. Can you read?”
I nodded.
“Rules are posted over there. You got two choices. Obey them. Or be dead. Case!”
A soldier came from a back office. “Yeah, Sarge?” “New trader. Go check him out. You at Blue Willy, Candle?”
“Yes.” The list of rules had not changed. It was the same paper, almost too faded to read. Basically, it said don’t mess with the Barrowland. Try it and if it don’t kill you, we will. “Sir?” the trooper said. “When you’re ready?” “I’m ready.”
We returned to Blue Willy. The soldier looked our gear over. The only things that intrigued him were my bow and the fact that we were well armed. “Why so many weapons?” “Been talk about trouble with the tribesmen.” “Must have gotten exaggerated. Just stealing.” Goblin and One-Eye attracted no special attention. I was pleased. “You read the rules. Stick to them.”
“I know them of old,” I said. “I was stationed here when I was in the army.”
He looked at me a bit narrowly, nodded, departed. We all sighed. Goblin took the spell of concealment off the gear he and One-Eye had brought. The empty corner behind Tracker filled with clutter.
“He might come right back,” I protested. “We don’t want to hold any spell any longer than we have to,” One-Eye said. “There might be somebody around who could detect it.”
“Right.” I cracked the shutters to our one window. The hinges shrieked. “Grease,” I suggested.
I looked across the town. We were on the third floor of the tallest building outside the Guard compound. I could see the Bomanz house. “Guys. Look at this.” They looked. “In damned fine shape, eh?” When last seen it was a candidate for demolition. Superstitious fear had kept it unused. I recalled pottering around in there several times. “Feel like a stroll, Tracker?” •
“Whatever makes you comfortable”-I wondered if he had enemies here-“I’d feel better if you were along.”
He strapped on his sword. Out we went, down, into the street-if that expanse of mud could be so called. The corduroy ran only to the compound, with a branch as far as Blue Willy. Beyond, there were walkways only.
We pretended to sightsee. I told Tracker stories about my last visit, most cast near the truth. I was trying to assume a foreign persona, voluble and jolly. I wondered if I was wasting my time. I saw no one interested in what I might say.
The Bomanz house had been lovingly restored. It did not appear to be occupied, though. Or guarded. Or set up as a monument. Curious. Come supper I asked our host. He had me pegged as a nostalgic fool already. He told us, “Some old boy moved in there about five years ago. Cripple. Did scut work for the Guard. Fixed the place up in his spare time.”
“What happened to him?”
“While back, couple four months I guess, he had a stroke or something. They found him still alive but like a vegetable. They took him over to the compound. Far as I know, he’s still there. Feeding him like a baby. That kid that was here to inspect you is the one to ask. Him and Corbie was friends.”
“Corbie, eh? Thanks. Another pitcher.”
“Come on, Croaker,” One-Eye said in a low voice. “Lay off the beer. The guy makes it himself. It’s terrible.”
He was right. But I was getting adjusted for some heavy thinking.
We had to get into that house. That meant night moves and wizards’ skills. It also meant our greatest risks since Goblin and One-Eye went silly in Roses.
One-Eye asked Goblin, “Think we’re up against a haunt?”
Goblin sucked his lip. “Have to look.”