The Seventh Friend (Book 1) (44 page)

He drained his second glass of wine and sought the difference of the Sirash. It was difficult this time. His heart still pounded and his blood raced from the exertion and anxiety of battle, but eventually his chanting worked, and the wine helped him to be calm.

He went straight to Pascha.

“Narak?”

“Did you retake the wall?”

“We did,” she replied.

“And can you hold it?”

“Against ten thousand? Possibly. We did not lose many men. Your Arbak is a lucky commander.”

“The best kind. How many dead?”

“About a hundred and fifty. We gained ninety from the Berashi who were here before, so our numbers have barely changed.”

Narak was astonished. He was expecting half their force to have perished. Untrained soldiers attacking a fortified position should not have fared anywhere near so well.

“One hundred and fifty?”

“Well, they had me to help them.”

“Pascha…”

“They also had his Durander piper, and the Berashis, the ones that survived the original attack on the gate, they came over the wall and divided the Telans attention, and indiscipline was a help.”

“Luck, then.”

“Yes.”

“And the Telans, the others, they’re not there yet?”

“Soon.”

“You will have to hold the gate. Tell Arbak. Any cost, any method. If the gate falls the rest of Terras will fall with it. The rest of the army cannot be there for weeks.”

“I will tell him.”

There was something about her voice. “He is alive?”

“Yes. He took a cut. He’s laid up, but I will tell him.”

Narak thought for a moment about going there himself, telling Arbak himself, but then he would leave and the men guarding the Green Road would feel abandoned. It was best that he stayed here unless he intended to stay as part of their defence. It was an idea that appealed to reason, but not at all to his gut, and his gut was in control just now.

He withdrew from the Sirash and sat in his chair. He really should bathe before the others arrived, he thought, but he did not move, except to pour another glass of wine. He sipped it slowly, and allowed himself the luxury of absence. He thought no thoughts, made no plans, worried about nothing, but instead stared at a patch of canvass on the tent wall and drifted in a waking sleep until a herald lifted the tent flap and announced that the others had come.

Arbak was surprised that Sheyani had been so upset. She blamed herself, her music, for sending him into such a dangerous place without the skills to defend himself adequately, but that was not how he saw it. She had not hidden his copper talisman, and after all was said and done he was a soldier again, and being in dangerous places was part of the trade. Men had died. He had taken a nasty blow, but he was still alive and his strength was returning.

When she had left him he had been visited by Coyan, the Durander colonel. The man had been alarmingly respectful. Men like Arbak usually took such respect as a sign that they were dying.

“It was a great victory, colonel,” Coyan said.

“It was lucky. Almost anything could have turned it into a disaster.”

Coyan grinned. “We Berashi believe that fortune is a quality of men, and that greatness requires her to sit at a man’s elbow. Today she was your slave, colonel. It is a good sign that she favours you so.”

Arbak wasn’t sure if he should take that as a compliment or an insult, and that opinion showed on his face. “The plan wasn’t
that
bad,” he said.

“Quite so,” Coyan agreed. “I am sure that I would have done something similar. We did not have a great deal of choice, but I would not, perhaps, have been so favoured.”

Arbak’s shoulder was still sore, more than sore, but he was adjusting to it. His right arm was numb and ached in a dull fashion, but he did not feel like staying in bed with the enemy so close. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and rested them on the floor.

“Pass me that cloak,” he said. Coyan brought it over and draped it over Arbak’s shoulders. He was glad of the gesture. Even fastening the clasp caused him to wince with the pain. He stood, and fought a moment’s dizziness.

“Are you sure about this, colonel? You lost a good deal of blood.”

“Call me Cain,” Arbak said.

“As you wish. Are you sure about this, Cain? It will not do for the men to see you too weak.”

“But it will do them good to see that I am not at death’s door,” he said. “I will manage to avoid fainting, I think.”

He pushed out through the tent flap with Coyan close behind him. The Durander seemed genuinely concerned for his wellbeing, which he found both touching and oddly surprising. He thought he understood it, though. He was the commander, and they had won a cheap victory. He had been among the men at such times often enough to know that they loved him for that alone. They would follow him now, with or without Sheyani’s music, wherever he led them. He was a talisman. Someone, perhaps it had been Sheyani, had mentioned that he was linked to Wolf Narak, and that would be spread through the ranks like a summer cold. By now half the men would believe he was Narak’s brother and the other half would claim he was Narak himself, heavily disguised.

He walked slowly down the pass to the wall and the gate. All around him he saw the remains of the battle. Most of the dead had been removed, most of the weapons had been gathered up, but he still saw things that had been missed. There were helmets and belt buckles, and a severed hand lying open on the ground as though begging for a coin.

The wall was heavily manned. As he approached he noted the burnt remains of the two stairs and a number of ropes hanging down. If that was the only way up to the fighting platform, then it was not enough. A man he had not seen before slipped over the edge of the platform and descended swiftly and expertly to the ground.

“Colonel Arbak, I am pleased to see you on your feet,” he said.

Arbak looked at him. He was clearly an officer, and clearly not in the first flush of youth. “Major Tragil?”

“Yes, sir,” the man answered. “And I have you to thank for getting my wall back.”

“Not for long,” Arbak said. “Without a quicker way to get men up onto the wall you’ll lose it on the first assault.”

The major shook his head. “We will have to do the best we can, colonel. We have no materials and the steps were burned when the Telans took the gate.”

“You have enough arrows?”

Again the Berashi shook his head. “We have archers, but not enough shafts to keep a great army at bay. We must hope for reinforcements.”

“We’ll see.” Arbak turned and walked back to the camp, his step more urgent, and still Coyan followed him, but this time more curious than concerned. He went among his own men, looking around the camp fires for a face he recognised.

“Cain,” the Durander said. “There are no reinforcements.”

“That’s true, but we have time, and we have people. Jerash!” He had found one of the men he was looking for. Jerash leaped to his feet. “Jerash, do you know where the rest of your crew are?”

“I can find them, sir.”

“Round them up. Bring every empty wagon that we have up to the wall, and that wagon with the white covering, bring that too, and bring your tools, all of you.”

“Sir.” Jerash hurried away. Arbak leaned against a wagon and covered his eyes for a moment.

“You have some plan?” Coyan asked.

“Of course,” he replied. “These men are not just soldiers, Coyan, they are tradesmen. Jerash is a journeyman carpenter. His friends are the same. The wagons are not important. We will use them to build steps.”

“Can they do that?”

“We will find out.”

He walked back down the pass again, and in spite of the urgency that drove him he walked slowly. His head was banging like a cheap tin drum and he could feel a cold sweat breaking out on his face. He was not fit even for this. By the time he reached the wall again he could see that a train of wagons was emerging from the camp.

“Major Tragil?”

Tragil appeared on the fighting platform above them and descended a rope. He looked expectant.

“Where do you want your steps, Major?” Arbak asked.

“You can see where they burned,” the major replied. “Either side would do.” He still looked expectant, but equally puzzled. The empty wagons began to arrive, each driven by a carpenter from Arbak’s regiment. He waited until the last wagon had stopped.

“You needed arrows,” he said. He pulled back the canvas cover from the only covered wagon. One end of it was stacked with arrows, and the rest filled with swords, shields, helmets, lances, breastplates and the like. “I borrowed this from the armoury before we left.”

Tragil’s eyes lit up. “It will make a difference,” he said. “But the steps…?”

Arbak turned to Jerash. “Steps,” he said. “One flight, sturdy as you can make it. It has to stand a lot of men running up and down it.” He pointed to the wagons. “Your raw material.”

“When do you want it, sir?” Jerash asked. He was looking at the wagons, sizing up the strength and quality of the wood.

“Now. Or as close to now as you can do it. A Telan army is on the way, and they could be here this afternoon.”

Jerash scratched his head and pulled a sour face. “To be strong it would need proper jointing, and the wood is too thin. We don’t have enough nails to do anything clever. Horain!” One of the other carpenters climbed down from a wagon. He was a young man, and kept glancing at Arbak and Coyan. “That ugly thing you built for master Bernalas in the winter, can you do something like that here? Would it bear the weight?”

Horain suddenly grinned and nodded. “Aye, I think it would, aye, and quick, too.”

“We’d need to brace it.”

“But easily done, and we can get strength by strapping it, though it might need to be tightened every week or so.”

“How long, Jerash?”

“You’ll not mind an eighteen inch step, sir?”

“I’ll not.”

“Then no more than two hours, and no less than one.”

“Do it.”

The men set too with a will, heaving the wagons onto their sides, flipping them over on their backs. They began to pull the wheels off.

“What are they doing?” Coyan asked.

“Damned if I know,” Arbak replied, “but we’ll have steps in two hours.” He needed to rest. His arms were both sore and the beating drum in his head had become a continuous screech of pain. He felt as though he hadn’t put water in his mouth for a week. “The Telans will come soon,” he said. “I’m in no state to be on the walls, steps or no, so you deal with it. They might run after one volley, knowing they’re too late for their purpose, if that was to reinforce the gate, or they might attack just once, out of pride, to see how strong we are. Whatever they do I expect them to be easily repelled. If they know the Seth Yarra are coming they’ll camp out of bowshot and join in their ally’s effort to retake it. Now I need sleep, and water.”

He turned and left Coyan by the gate, walking one last time along the pass to the camp. He stopped at one of the water barrels and drank four cups down straight. It made him feel a little better, but he called for a physic anyway. There had to be some herb to lessen the pain.

Sheyani was waiting for him in the tent. She sat by the bed as though he were in it.

“You should not be walking about,” she said.

“My head tells me you are right, Sheyani. Will you play for me? Something soothing?”

She smiled. “Of course I will play for you
H
,” she said. “I will play and the pain in your head will go, but first you must eat and drink. I have some food, and the juice of crushed apples.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“You will need strength. You will feel better if you eat now.”

He looked at the food. It was buttered bread, slices of fruit cut into bite sized pieces, and bacon.

“Bacon? Where did you get that?”

“Some of the Duranders were grateful,” she said, and she began to play. Somehow the music stimulated his appetite, and he picked at the food, drank the juice. The pain in his head faded to a dull ache, and he felt sleepy. He did not want to sleep. He had already passed twelve hours with his eyes closed since the battle, and it was not yet midday.

Despite his wishes Sheyani played, and his eyes closed.