Demontech: Gulf Run (7 page)

Meanwhile, older children collected dry wood and women got the cookfires burning. Middle-size children ran gaily to a nearby rill with buckets, struggling back just as gaily with water for the wounded and cooking. Haft busied himself setting quartets of soldiers in a sentry line south of the battleground and other watchers in the tops of high trees. Spinner tried to look like he was putting order to the camp while staying out of the way of Fletcher and Zweepee, who were really doing that job.

Soon water was boiling in pots into which chunks of meat, vegetables, and tubers were tossed, along with salt and what other spices were available. Cooking aromas began wafting under the trees.

Silent, the giant nomad from the steppes, came in more than an hour before sunset—he’d expected to arrive at dusk but the caravan had stopped early. The six Skragland Borderers who, like Silent, had been on distant patrols looking for a Jokapcul army that might be following, returned about the same time. Wolf greeted Silent with a yip and a bound to his chest. The giant ruffled the fur on Wolf’s shoulders. Wolf then padded at the giant’s side, brushing against his leg, occasionally lifting his head to be petted by the giant’s dangling fingertips.

Silent, for a wonder, lived up to his name as he examined the battleground and looked at the wounded from both sides, seeing the extent of the graves.

Spinner, feeling mostly useless, finally stopped pretending to oversee the camp and joined him.

“I was too far from the road,” Silent said quietly, “looking for bandits in the forest. I didn’t see the Jokap sign until I checked the road before coming back. Then I saw a troop had passed. I followed fast to catch them, then to come ahead and warn you. I found the place where the rear guard ambushed the patrol trailing us. The lancer troop spent a short time there, then continued at speed. I didn’t stop and try to question any of the wounded still alive, instead I got here as fast as I could. But the fight was already over.” He shook his shaggy head. “If I’d been near the road all along I could have given you warning.”

“No you couldn’t,” Spinner replied. “They were at a canter, you couldn’t beat them, they would have reached us first no matter where you were.”

Silent grunted. He thought he might have been able to reach the caravan in time if he’d seen the lancer troop. “How many did we lose?” He didn’t need an answer, he knew within one or two how many were lost just from the length of the common grave.

“Three of ours dead, two seriously enough wounded they might not live. Seven of the others are dead and four more very badly wounded. I’m not sure how many wounded all told.”

Silent looked toward the hospital pavilion. “They’re bandits, you know.”

Spinner nodded slowly. “Yes. But they’re fleeing the Jokapcul, the same as us.”

Silent’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Veduci’s wounded. “Can the snow leopard change its spots?”

“They fought alongside us, many of them died in the fight.”

“I saw no other bandits,” Silent said briskly, turning from the pavilion, but Spinner noticed the
other
. “There was a sign of bandits moving north, though. None of them coming to this road, it was like they wanted to keep to the deep forest. Like they think the Jokapcul can’t follow them into the forest.” He hawked into a bush that had been broken in the fight. “I think we’ll be safe from bandits for a while, anyway.” He glanced back at the pavilion. “At least until those are well enough. How many of them are left?”

“Twelve men, nearly all wounded.”

Silent grunted again. He sniffed the air. “Something smells good, and I’m hungry.” He turned and strode from the battlefield toward the encampment. Spinner had to scurry to keep up with the nomad’s long strides.

Haft watched the middle-size children scamper off with the covered trenchers and waterskins for the pickets, amazed and delighted as always at their eagerness to fetch and carry and turn every chore into a game. The children seemed to think taking food and water to the sentries was a reward, a special treat, and performed that chore more eagerly than any other. Maybe it was: the soldiers and other men on sentry duty usually allowed the children to stay with them for a time and “help” watch. The children believed that by “helping watch” they were performing an important duty and being treated like grown-ups instead of children.

“Haft!”

He turned to the voice and smiled at Maid Marigold. She had been a serving girl at Eikby’s Middle of the Forest Inn—when there’d been an Eikby and a Middle of the Forest Inn.

“It’s your turn,” she said, smiling at him and holding up a bowl.

His smile broadened and he joined the group gathering around the cookfire with its boiling pot.

Fletcher, Alyline, and Doli were already there, as was Maid Primrose, who had worked alongside Maid Marigold at the inn. Maid Marigold and Doli had worked with Maid Primrose to prepare dinner. Spinner and Silent joined the group right after Haft took his place on a log and accepted the steaming bowl of stew from his lover.

“Where’s Zweepee?” Alyline asked.

“She said she’d be here once she saw all the wounded were fed,” Fletcher replied.

Alyline nodded, Zweepee took her responsibilities seriously. Spinner and Haft had instituted a policy Lord Gunny had brought with him from—from—from wherever he’d come from: the leaders didn’t eat until everybody else was served.

A proper commander always feeds his people before he eats himself. That makes sure the commander has provided enough food for his people,
Lord Gunny wrote in the
Handbook for Sea Soldiers. Any commander who doesn’t take care of his people will lose his war.

The caravan carried enough food to last the trip to Dartmutt at the head of Princedon Gulf, enough and more. But what if Dartmutt didn’t have enough food to feed the influx of refugees who must be congregating there? So caring for food and gathering more was necessary for the caravan. As they moved along the road, the women and older children who weren’t needed to move animals and wagons along or tend to babies and oldsters often roamed under the trees in search of mushrooms, tubers, or other edibles. The point and flanking patrols kept watch for game as well as Jokapcul and bandits, and brought in what they could catch without neglecting their primary duties. Pairs of hunters prowled the forest beyond the flanks and point in search of game. They didn’t find much; it seemed even the animals of the forest were fleeing the invaders.

For a few moments there were only the slurping and chewing sounds of eating around the fire. An occasional voice was raised elsewhere, mostly the cries of children happy to be traveling on what they thought was a grand adventure. Horses snorted in a nearby tether line, or pawed at the ground. The thin smoke from the fire kept most of the buzzing insects at a respectful distance. Wolf quietly gnawed on a bone; he’d dined earlier on one of the Jokapcul horses killed in the battle. But it wasn’t polite to mention that—the people weren’t anywhere near ready to eat horse meat.

Spinner kept looking to the south, though he couldn’t see very far through the trees. Looking into trees that blocked his view was easier than looking where he’d have to see Doli and Maid Primrose pointedly ignoring him.

Once the edge was off his hunger, he asked Silent, “When do you think they’ll come again?”

Silent swallowed loudly and belched before answering. “I saw or heard nothing but the Jokaps you dealt with on our back trail. Neither did the Borderers who scouted deep back.” He looked south as though he could see through the trees. “They won’t come at night, I think. If any more are following now, they’re camped for the night. If we move out soon after dawn, no one should reach us before midday. But if there was more than one troop, I think they would have come together. I also think I would have seen sign.”

“Why did they come faster after they saw their trailing patrol had been killed?” Spinner hadn’t considered that earlier, he’d been too busy with other matters for it to occur to him. Now that he thought about it, it didn’t seem to make sense.

Silent shrugged. “Who knows what a Jokap officer thinks? If they read the signs as well as I did, they knew their patrol was attacked by a small rear guard. Maybe they hoped to catch them and get revenge.”

“That would have left them free to harry our rear,” Fletcher said. “They could have done us a great deal of injury before we could organize a counterattack.”

Haft snorted. “My rear point still would have beaten them,” he growled.

“No,” Spinner said. “You caught the first by surprise—and that lancer troop was much larger than the patrol you ambushed. If they didn’t beat you immediately, the commander could have split his force, kept half of it back to deal with you, and sent the rest ahead to attack the caravan.”

Silent nodded agreement with both. “We still would have beaten them, but at a much higher cost.” He looked back into the trees. “But I don’t think any more are following us now. What do you think, Wolf?”

Wolf looked up from the bone he was worrying and cocked his head at the steppe giant as though considering his answer.

“Ulgh!”
he finally said with a vigorous shake of his head and shoulders.

“Do you want to backtrack tonight and make sure?” Silent asked.

Wolf growled and lowered his head and shoulders as though preparing to pounce.

“Good. We go in an hour.”

“It’s too dangerous to go back at night.” Alyline spoke for the first time. “A patrol couldn’t go far enough and have time to get back before we leave in the morning. Then the men would be tired and have to take up wagon space to sleep.”

Silent chuckled, a bass rumble deep in his throat. “Just me and Wolf, we can do it and be back in time.”

“If no one is behind us,” Zweepee interjected, “we can stay here for a day or two. Our wounded need time to rest and heal. And we can use the time to gather more food. We
can
stop for a day or two if nobody’s following, can’t we, Spinner?”

“Maybe we can,” Spinner replied in a voice that sounded like he didn’t think they could.

Not long after that they finished their stew, wiping the bowls clean with bread old enough that it was turning stale and brittle.

Alyline and Zweepee, trailed by Doli, set out to check the encampment. Maid Primrose looked longingly after them before she turned to help Maid Marigold bank the fire and give the dishes a better cleaning. Silent stretched out for a short nap before he and Wolf left to check the back trail. Fletcher went to check on the horses.

Spinner stood. “Let’s check the lines,” he said to Haft.

Haft led the way because he’d placed the sentries and knew where they were.

It was night under the trees by the time they reached the first post. The four soldiers, Zobran Royal lancers, were nestled in a fall of tree trunks. If Haft hadn’t remembered where he placed them, he and Spinner would have gone by without seeing the quartet. A stout tree had been felled by a lightning strike and dropped two lesser trees with it, the three forming a strong barrier the Zobrans were able to hide behind. Bushes behind them hid their silhouettes as they looked over the logs.

“Lord Haft, Lord Spinner,” the Zobrans murmured greetings after signs and countersigns were exchanged.

“Don’t call me ’Lord,’ ” Spinner muttered.

“Guma, Lyft, Ealu, Eaomod,” Haft greeted them by name. “Hear anything out there?”

“Only the birds bedding down for the night,” Guma replied.

“See anything?”

“Nothing moves.”

Haft looked into the tree-night. “What’s that?” he asked, pointing at a shadow that could be the head and shoulders of a lurking man.

Guma looked along Haft’s arm to see what he meant. “That’s a boysenberry bush,” he murmured. “I knew it could be mistaken for a man when I watched night come.”

“You memorized.”

“Of course, Lord Haft. We all did. You taught us well.”

“He’s not a lord either,” Spinner muttered.

Haft’s grin went unseen in the dark and he ignored Spinner. He squeezed Guma’s shoulder. “You learned well.”

That was another of the lessons Lord Gunny had brought from—from wherever. Sentries on night watch should carefully examine their fronts as dusk faded to dark and memorize every shape and shadow as they changed, so when they looked out in the night they would know if they saw a shadow that hadn’t been there in the light—and so they wouldn’t mistake something that had been there as a threat.

They sat and watched and listened with the Zobrans for several more minutes. Nothing moved before their eyes. All they heard was the
whishing
of night fliers above, the buzzing of flying insects close by their ears, and the lightly skittering steps of small night browsers.

“Two up and two down,” Spinner reminded them before they left; two men to watch while two slept. They visited the other posts, each in turn. Half of the men on watch were Zobran soldiers, the other half trained men from Eikby. All the watchers ignored Spinner’s muttered objections to being called “lord.”

When they got back to the camp and checked the hospital pavilion, they found all the wounded sleeping, some restlessly, most quietly. Nightbird, the healing witch from Bostia who joined them somewhere in southeastern Skragland or northeastern Zobra—nobody had been sure where they were at the time—sat watching quietly over them.

“Two are still in danger,” Nightbird said softly. “The others mostly need time and rest.”

“Time,” Spinner repeated. Time was the one thing he thought they didn’t have. Even if the Jokapcul weren’t closely pursuing them, he felt an urgent need to get the refugees to Dartmutt as quickly as possible.

“Time,” Nightbird confirmed. “Even a day or two will make a huge difference. If we move them too soon, some who aren’t in danger now will be in danger then. The two who are now in danger could die if they are moved too soon.”

“Can the healing demons heal them faster?”

Nightbird stiffened in the darkness; healing witches generally didn’t trust healing magicians and their demons. They knew what their unguents and poultices could do. One could never predict with certainty what a demon might decide to do.